Newspaper headlines: Muslim women, steel jobs, NHS chief and Chinese food By Nigel Pankhurst

BBC News Published duration 19 January 2016

David Cameron's comments that some Muslim women's lack of English leaves them at more risk of succumbing to extremism stirs up plenty of discussion.

Critics of the prime minister have included former Conservative party chairman Baroness Warsi who said he was "stereotyping communities".

The Independent says he faced a "backlash" after linking language skills and extremism, while the Guardian says he was accused of stigmatising Muslim women.

"Mr Cameron has started a journey whose destination will not be reached until after his departure," he says. "Too many Muslim women today are trapped.

"Helping them to speak English is a first step to setting them free to make themselves rich: it is a very Conservative dream."

image copyright AP

He says: "What seems to you more likely to radicalise a young British Muslim: having a mother around the house who does not speak very good English, or having that same mother deported, because of the fact she struggles with the language. I don't think it is a hard question."

However, the Sun comes to Mr Cameron's support by saying we should empower migrant women by ensuring they learn English.

The paper comments: "The Sun is not convinced about the language classes he proposes. They should learn through proper assimilation with the Britain around them.

"And yes, those who fail to do so in a set time should face the threat of deportation - with their families."

Adams' cartoon in the Telegraph has Mr Cameron saying: "Immigrants must learn to speak English or be deported!", with Donald Trump responding: "Bit extreme".

'Bitter blow'

The bleak news that hundreds of jobs in the British steel industry are to be lost is widely covered in the papers.

The jobs will go at Tata steel plants at Port Talbot, Trostre, Hartlepool and Corby.

The Financial Times reports that union leaders have warned the industry faces catastrophe unless the UK government deals with the situation over China.

"The warning came as Britain's biggest steelmaker said it was cutting more than 1,000 jobs, prompting recriminations that the UK was failing to stand up for the steel industry in the face of a deluge of cheap Chinese imports," it says.

"The decision underlines the evisceration of Britain's steel industry, which during the past year has either shed or outlined plans to cut more than 6,000 jobs from a workforce that was 30,000-strong at the start of 2015."

The FT continues: "While global producers have been hit by a sharp decline in prices amid a supply glut, UK steelmakers complain they are saddled with the additional burden of high energy costs and business rates, as well as the impact of a strong pound."

image copyright Getty Images

The Guardian says the government "faced renewed calls to tackle the crisis engulfing the British steel industry after the UK's largest steelmaker said it would make more than 1,000 job cuts".

Unions accused the government of failing to match its rhetoric with action, it adds.

"Hands up, who wants to open a trade war with China to protect the UK's, and the European Union's, steelmakers?" he writes.

"The sad truth about the crisis in the UK steel industry may be this: in the current climate, nothing less than stiff tariffs on imported Chinese steel will improve meaningfully the lot of UK and EU producers."

The Sun states that the destruction of steel jobs is not the government's fault - but it must not shrug its shoulders either.

"The new losses at Tata will devastate communities dependent on that work. And although taxpayers must not bail out a dying industry it does not serve Britain for thousands of productive workers to be put on benefits either," it says.

"The government must slash the green levies costing steel plants dear. It must also provide serious money to retrain redundant workers and offer big tax breaks for firms setting up in the area. We must give ex-steel workers a future."

'Times of need'

He questions whether some of the money spent on increasing state pensions should instead be allocated for social care.

Mr Stevens tells the Guardian: "Would intergenerational fairness support a further increase in the share of public funding on retirees, at the expense of children and working-age people?

"Does there need to be more flexibility between current disconnected funding streams for older people, so that at times of need every one is guaranteed high-quality social care?"

He says: "We don't simply revere the National Health Service - we worship it. Why wouldn't we, given it's a nationwide public institution with branch offices in every town and hamlet; and a mechanism for the redistribution of the most precious resource known to us: the preservation of life itself?

"It goes further, though, because the NHS is for many of us what takes religion's place when it comes to contemplating our end - for, if there's one thing we devoutly wish, it's to cease upon the midnight hour cosseted and with no pain whatsoever.

"The terminal is of the essence when it comes to healthcare anyway - given the vast majority of spending on any individual takes place in the last six weeks of their life."

Free chopsticks

"With students notorious for surviving on cheep and cheerful culinary delights such as baked beans, Pot Noodles and endless rounds of toast, British universities have never been under pressure to offer much in their canteens beyond chips, pasta and pizza," it says.

"However, the influx of Chinese students may be about to change all that. Campus chiefs worried that the number of big-spending foreign students, especially those from China, are being put off by Britain's terrible reputation abroad for its food, are planning a makeover of their menus."

The paper explains that it comes in the wake of a fact-finding trip to China - organised by The University Caterers Organisation (Tuco) - by a dozen British universities.

media caption Daily Record political editor Torcuil Crichton and Times defence editor Deborah Haynes join the BBC News Channel to review Tuesday's front pages.

Tuco chairwoman Julie Barker tells the Independent: "While our degree education might be world-class our food remains a joke across the globe.

"This partly stems from our current attempts to replicate international cuisine; after our trip to China I think we all agree that we have been getting it wrong so far."

Apparently, it emerged during the trip that charging for chopsticks was not a good idea.

One of the delegates, University of Glasgow chief executive Scott Girvan, commented: "Imagine you are a Chinese student and you have to pay for chopsticks.