Newspaper headlines: 'Damning' report into government Covid 'failings'

The verdict of two select committees on the UK's early response to the coronavirus pandemic dominates many front pages.

The Times notes that the government is said to have made "big mistakes", particularly in not introducing a lockdown quickly enough, and that "group-think" among ministers, civil servants and scientific advisers was chiefly responsible.

The Financial Times describes the findings as "damning".

It says the British response was "bungled" and "fatalistic", which led to a strategy that amounted to "herd immunity" - despite the country having "some of the best expertise available anywhere in the world".

The Guardian focuses on that "fatalistic" approach and evidence, it says, of "British exceptionalism". The paper says these factors exacerbated the number of deaths.

Under a headline "Deadliest of delays", the Daily Mirror suggests that more than 20,000 lives could have been saved, if Boris Johnson had locked down the UK a week earlier in March last year. The i newspaper puts the figure at "many thousands".

For the Daily Mail, the report is "devastating". It highlights what it calls the "needless" deaths of many thousands of people in care homes - which it says resulted from the elderly being treated as an "afterthought".

The Mail recalls that in the first month of lockdown, 25,000 hospital patients were discharged into care homes without being tested for Covid.

The Metro pictures the prime minister, England's chief medical officer Prof Chris Whitty, and the government's chief scientific adviser Sir Patrick Vallance in Downing Street. Its headline is "shamed over Covid".

The Sun points out that the MPs also found that the vaccination rollout was "one of the most effective in the world". Its Covid verdict: "From bad job to good jab".

After a Treasury official accused the Business Secretary Kwasi Kwarteng of "making things up", the Times says the Chancellor Rishi Sunak has lost his Whitehall battle with Mr Kwarteng.

According to the paper, Boris Johnson is backing a bailout of industries hit hard by high gas prices, through a programme of state-backed loans.

The Financial Times speaks of Mr Sunak "weighing up" a rescue plan.

The Daily Telegraph leads with the findings of the Institute for Fiscal Studies on the state of the public finances ahead of the Budget in two weeks.

The Telegraph says the think tank has concluded that the national insurance tax rises announced by Boris Johnson will not be enough to fund the NHS - and that the levy may need to more than double.

The paper reckons this could add nearly £1,000 to the annual tax bill of a worker earning £40,000.

The Sun's main story is that an Insulate Britain protester who was arrested for blocking the M25 is married to a road boss responsible for traffic flow at Transport for London.

According to the paper, the ecoactivist has been "plotting to unleash hell" on motorists, while her husband's job is to keep traffic moving. The Sun's headline: "Hashtag Awks".

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