The Australian

leads with the Coalition’s split as Liberal and Nationals MPs clashed
bitterly over student unions and the Telstra sale, despite John
Howard’s call for cohesion and discipline. Matt Price
describes the action in the Coalition’s first party room meeting
yesterday as National Barnaby Joyce clashed with influential NSW
senator Bill Heffernan. The Oz also reports that Telstra boss Sol Trujillo
has been called to Canberra for a meeting with John Howard tomorrow to
hear the government’s planned package of regulatory checks and
balances for a fully privatised Telstra.

The Sydney Morning Herald
goes big with the safe landing of the Discovery shuttle under the
headline: “Seven wonders of the modern world.” Also front page news is
a story on the unravelling of two of the Carr Government’s most significant planning decisions
– on water supply and the location of Sydney’s new suburbs and green
belts – Premier Morris Iemma’s new regime admits mistakes were made on
where to build 160,000 homes. And healthy baby-boomers
are continuing the drinking habits established in their youth, even
though their bodies may be unable to take the pace, according to
research from the National Centre for Education and Training on
Addiction.

The Age
continues to give the police files debacle a good run, leading with the
news that state Opposition has no confidence in the Privacy
Commissioner’s investigation into the Office of Police Integrity. The Age also runs a large picture of Family First senator Steve Fielding’s first day in parliament surrounded by his large extended family. Meanwhile, businessman Lindsay Fox and Greg Norman
have joined forces to build a $100 million golf course, a 163-room
hotel and 506 town houses at Phillip Island, adjacent to the Island’s
motor racing circuit, which Fox bought last year.

The Herald Sun
splashes with the results of a Herald Sun survey of ten Victorian imams
who answered questions relating to terrorism, including whether or not
Osama bin Laden was responsible for the September 11 attacks and if
radical Muslim terrorists were behind the London bombings. And
Steve Vizard’s accountant Greg Lay
has stepped down as chair of Bentleys MRI, one of Australia’s biggest
accounting firms, following his refusal to give evidence on the grounds
he could incriminate himself.

The Daily Telegraph
splashes with the state’s speed camera fiasco after the Roads and
Traffic Authority admitted it could not prove the authenticity of the
pictures taken, meaning fines issued by speed cameras could be
invalid. And ASIO
is examining a videotape of a man wearing a balaclava and speaking
English with an Australian accent that was aired on the Dubai-based
Al-Arabiya satellite channel.

The Courier-Mail
reports that Queensland hospital emergency departments are in chaos
according to a scathing submission to the health inquiry, which claims
the chronic problems are being deliberately concealed from the public. The Advertiser
celebrates the safe return of the space shuttle Discovery and local boy
Andy Thomas with a full page splash the dramatic space flight. The West Australian
says Union boss Kevin Reynolds has lifted the stakes in WA’s growing
industrial battle, claiming that tough new federal laws would serve
only to fuel the “class warfare” and that the Gallop Government was
partially to blame for industrial action on the Mandurah railway. And a
coronial inquest in the Northern Territory had heard that petrol
sniffing may have played a part in up to 60 Aboriginal deaths in the
Territory in the past seven years, and is seen as a “viable lifestyle
choice” by some young Aborigines, says the NT News.