What the papers say

Journalist Liz Kennedy takes a look at what is making the headlines in Friday's morning papers.

Karen Matthews, now convicted of staging her daughter's kidnapping has most coverage....

"Mother of Pure Evil" in the Daily Mirror and "Pure Evil" simply the headline in the Belfast Telegraph and the Sun.

Karen Matthews was described in those words by the detective who led the investigation into her daughter's disappearance.

According to the Sun and the Belfast Telegraph, police believe Shannon Matthews could have been killed, if her mother's co-plotter Michael Donovan had escaped with her.

The Mirror says "she may have been just minutes from death" when she was rescued.

The Belfast Telegraph has five pages devoted to what it dubs the "mercenary plot", the biggest single investigation carried out by West Yorkshire Police since the Yorkshire Ripper hunt 30 years ago.

Mixed monetary news, good amidst the bad.

A yellow smiley face on the front page of the Sun greets the Bank of England's decision to slash interest rates to 2% - but the Daily Mail isn't quite so cheerful. "Millions of savers have been thrown to the wolves," it says, particularly older people.

And that story about the effect on the elderly makes the lead in Friday's News Letter as well.

Pensioners who have paid off their mortgages and built up savings over their lifetime look set to be losers, after what a local economist describes in the paper as "something of a reward for the feckless."

But the Independent asks whether the authorities are "running out of ammunition" in their fight to avert the worst downturn since the Second World War and says that Alistair Darling is "running out of options".

Power bills

Meanwhile, an attempt to save householders a bit of cash, this time on their electricity bills, is the lead in the Irish News.

A "hard-hitting review" by a former electricity regulator is detailed on the front page and the paper's editorial says that the report into the 33% hike in power prices earlier this year is expected to recommend "changes in the way NIE operates, to prevent such massive charges in the future".

In the southern papers, the focus is on financial matters as well.

The Irish Independent and the Irish Times both lead on the benchmark interest rate cut by the European Central Bank and the delay by banks in passing it on to customers and the photo lead in both papers is the same shot through a car windscreen.

It shows the now ex-Sunderland manager Roy Keane and his wife Theresa arriving back at their house in Cheshire.

Theresa is covering her face, but Mr Keane looks, as reporter Ian O'Doherty puts it in the Independent like "a warrior bowed, but not defeated."

He speaks of Keano's "complex duality" and whether he's perceived as a "hero or villain, patriot or traitor" even six years after what O'Doherty calls the "whole Saipan mess".

He concludes there is a "sneaking suspicion" that Roy Keane finally walked because his pride couldn't handle the prospect of possible humiliation for Sunderland at Old Trafford on Saturday, in front of Alex Ferguson, Keane's former mentor.

Something fishy

And finally food labelling makes one of the snappiest headlines of the day.

Improve fish labelling "for cod's hake" says a headline in the Guardian.

One in 10 restaurants and takeaways is giving a false description of its fish, apparently.

Apart from the shortage of some fish, the Food Standards Agency calls it "food fraud"and says that consumers should remember that scientific tests can determine what fish is under the batter in your takeaway.