Newspaper headlines: May and Javid 'clash' over knife crime By BBC News

Staff Published duration 6 March 2019

image copyright PA image caption Home Secretary Sajid Javid has written in the Daily Telegraph about knife crime

The Daily Telegraph suggests that the home secretary and the prime minister are at loggerheads about knife crime.

It reports that they had a "testy exchange" on Tuesday - when Sajid Javid asked Theresa May for emergency funding to deal with the problem.

This includes bolstering police powers and increasing funding for forces.

image caption Yousef Makki and Jodie Chesney, both 17, were killed in separate knife attacks two days apart

The Times has a letter from the former Metropolitan Police Commissioner, Lord Blair. He argues that the government could learn from the way in which Tony Blair responded to the surge in street crime in 2002 when he was prime minister.

The letter states that Mr Blair immediately acknowledged the scale of the crisis - and "personally chaired a series of meetings by Cobra, the cross-departmental crisis committee".

Macron letter

Under the headline "merci, Macron", the Sun's leader thanks the French president for writing to people across Europe, proposing a series of reforms to protect the EU.

The Sun describes the letter as "magnificently self-important".

It suggests that by saying Brussels should have more control, Mr Macron has inadvertently boosted the Brexit cause.

"A few leavers might have been wobbling - no longer," it concludes.

image copyright Reuters image caption Emmanuel Macron has published an open letter to Europe in newspapers across the continent

Writing on the Huffpost UK website, Labour MP Jim Fitzpatrick says that even though he voted remain in the Brexit referendum in 2016, he is now inclined to back Theresa May's deal in the Commons.

He urges his colleagues on the Labour benches to do the same.

Mr Fitzpatrick, the MP for Poplar and Limehouse, in London, says Mrs May's reassurances on the issue of workers' rights, and her promise of extra funding for towns that are struggling economically, have helped to make up his mind.

Cashless society

The Daily Mail is worried that Britain's entire cash-handling system is "on the verge of collapse".

It has details of a report commissioned by the cash machine network Link, which warns that the infrastructure for handling money is becoming too expensive to run.

The UK, it suggests, is at risk of "sleepwalking" into a cashless society within 15 years.

The paper believes that will be a "daunting spectre" for many people, particularly the elderly and vulnerable.

The Financial Times says that plans by the Scottish National Party to continue using the pound in the event of independence from the rest of the UK are proving controversial.

Some in the party believe the move would be necessary until a new currency could be established.

But George Kerevan, an economist and former SNP MP, tells the paper there is "a lot of suspicion" about the idea.

Two-inch handbag

Finally, The Guardian reports that the fashion world has been left "in a spin" by an item that was paraded on the catwalks at Paris Fashion Week.

The Jacquemus Mini Le Chiquito handbag is only two inches long - which has prompted many to wonder what could be carried inside it.