Newspaper headlines: 'Waggro' and a carbon emissions investigation By BBC News

Staff Published duration 10 October 2019

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The Daily Telegraph claims that Brexit talks with the EU will formally conclude in the next 24 hours - if Boris Johnson and his Irish counterpart, Leo Varadkar, fail to find a way forward on the Irish border when they meet later today.

It says the prospects of an agreement look "slim" - even though the PM has told Conservative MPs he's "desperate" to get one.

In an interview with the paper , the former chancellor, Philip Hammond, says that if the talks fail, Mr Johnson should consider a "rapid-fire zero-tariff trade deal" with the EU - leaving Northern Ireland in a separate backstop.

"It's important," insists Mr Hammond, "we send a message to Brussels that the well isn't run dry of ideas; that there is still a deal to be done."

The Sun reports that Labour is ready to grant Mr Johnson a general election on 26 November , if he fails to deliver Brexit at the end of the month.

It says that - providing a delay to Brexit is enforced next week - Jeremy Corbyn will support a new bid to dissolve Parliament and go to the country.

But according to the Spectator website , some figures in government are sceptical there will be an election before the spring.

"Labour MPs are looking at the polls and they don't like what they are seeing," one unnamed cabinet minister suggests, adding: "The better the Tories fare, the more they are reluctant to have one."

The Guardian's front page is devoted to a special investigation on fossil fuel companies and their impact on climate change.

It names 20 firms it says have produced 480 billion tonnes of greenhouse gases since 1965 - more than a third of all global carbon emissions.

One expert tells the paper that the fossil fuel industry knew in the late 1950s that its products had a detrimental effect on the environment, but "wilfully ignored" the threat in some cases.

Seven companies responded to the investigation, acknowledging they had an "important role" to play in addressing the climate crisis.

They added that they were making efforts to invest in renewable or low-carbon technology.

There's a mixed response to the call from England's outgoing chief medical officer to ban eating and drinking on public transport, in an attempt to stop children snacking.

The Daily Mail describes Dame Sally Davies as "nanny-in-chief" , while Kate Andrews in the Daily Express says the idea is so extreme "it suggests an unhealthy obsession with consumption on the part of the public health officials who cooked it up".

"These may seem ludicrous to some," it argues, "but so once did a ban on smoking in public places."

Finally, the Daily Mirror reports on the sentencing of a man who ordered a cheeseburger while robbing a branch of McDonald's in Coventry last year.

Daniel Parra-Braun demanded that a cashier empty the till - but was told he would have to buy something before it would open.