Paedophile satire dominates papers

The ability of the small screen to generate column inches is clearly demonstrated.

The continuing controversy surrounding the satirical Channel Four programme, Brass Eye, which featured a spoof investigation into paedophilia, leads The News of the World to publish a "Roll Of Shame".

With echoes of its campaign to name and shame paedophiles, it lists all of the people involved in what it describes as "a despicable show".

'Rampant hysteria

Jenny McCartney, writing in the Sunday Telegraph argues that the way that papers like the News Of World react with "rampant hysteria to paedophilia" makes the subject deserving of satire.

There's a robust defence of Brass Eye from the chief executive of Channel Four, Michael Jackson.

Writing in The Observer he insists that the show had "a real sense of social purpose" and argues that "often it's only when a punchline has finished that we can see the uncomfortable but serious point behind the joke".

The conclusion of another Channel Four programme prompts The Sunday People to ask: "What are we going to do without Big Brother?".

Fans it seems will only have to wait until next year, with The Sunday Times reporting that the show's producers are planning to overhaul the format "to encourage more intimate behaviour".

Writing in The Mail on Sunday, Dr John Casey, despairs at the popularity of the reality show.

He argues that the fact that millions can be "fascinated by the sprawling narcissists of Big Brother shows that we have lost all sense of the place of imagination in our lives".

Dome disaster

According to the Sunday Mirror the winner of the show, Bryan Dowling, may turn his back on a lucrative career as a TV star, telling the paper that he's happy being an airline steward, and is keen to get back to serving drinks and sandwiches again in September.

If media exposure is the key to success, it doesn't appear to have worked for the former chief executive of the Millennium Dome, Pierre-Yves Gerbeau.

The Sunday TImes reports that he is reluctantly preparing to return to France, because he claims he has been shunned by ministers and ignored by potential employers.

The paper believes he "deserves better", suggesting that he may be the right man to sort out the troubled Wembley Stadium project.

Or perhaps he could take a lead from the disgraced former Tory MP, Johnathon Aitken, who according to The Sunday Express hopes to rake in up to £10,000 a week on the after-dinner speaking circuit when his bankruptcy order ends next year. An agent tells the paper that his notoriety would make him in demand.

The Sunday Times raises the prospect of police bringing a charge of corporate manslaughter against Railtrack over the Hatfield crash.

According to the paper, British Transport police believe there is sufficient evidence to bring charges over the accident which killed four people.

They have sent a report on their investigation to the Crown Prosecution Service.