What the papers say

Journalist Andy Wood takes a look at what is making the headlines in Wednesday's morning newspapers.

According to Wednesday's News Letter, Belfast councillors want to see the city turned into a "24-hour centre", able to sustain life outside shopping hours.

The paper's lead story, which features Belfast's response to the Planning Service's new Belfast Metropolitan Area Plan, says councillors envisage a city where people list "socialising and spending quality time" among their reasons for visiting.

The News Letter says there is a need to address the problems of Belfast at night.

"The city centre resembles a ghost town once the workers and shoppers have disappeared," says the paper.

A 16% rise is a damned good deal in anybody's books

The Sun

"If the dream of a 24-hour metropolis is to be realised, much more needs to be done."

The Irish News also takes a front page look at the changing shape of the city, claiming to have seen a briefing paper from the Department for Regional Development aiming to build a new ring road across south Belfast.

The paper says it could cost as much as £50m and carries a quote from Sinn Fein's councillor Chrissie McCauley, the chairperson of the council's development committee, who says the proposals will be strongly opposed.

Moving south and Taoiseach Bertie Ahern's remarks on child sex abuse dominate the front page of the Irish Times.

'Fear on the streets'

Calling Mr Ahern's words "an unusually direct intervention by the state in church matters", the paper reports that he told the Dail "the law of the land applied to everybody - regardless of what rank they held".

The Irish Times leader weighs in with the comment: "The sooner a statutory enquiry is established into clerical child sex abuse in the Dublin Archdiocese, the better - anything less would be seen as a failure of nerve."

The Guardian opts for the sniper killing around Washington for a powerful front page show.

Headlined "Fear on the streets: the sniper and the mailman," the article chronicles the working day of American postman Alan Antonacci whose run took him along the bus route where bus driver Conrad Johnson (the sniper's 13th victim) was killed.

'A damned good deal'

"It seems like this area is snake-bitten all of a sudden," says Mr Antonacci.

Several cross-channel papers give prominence to the threatened firefighter's strike.

The Daily Telegraph says Tony Blair's hopes of averting the strike suffered "a body blow" with the TUC's expression of "full support" for the Fire Brigades Union.

The Times says the prime minister is determined to defeat a new wave of union militancy, believing it to be a return to the "Scargillism" of the past.

The Independent says Transport Secretary Alistair Darling has warned motorists to reduce speed because firefighters would not be available to help at accidents.

The Sun calls on the firemen to accept a 16% rise which it says is "a damned good deal in anybody's books".