Sunday newspaper round-up: Budget, Prudential, BP

The Chancellor, George Osborne, is expected to deliver on Tuesday one of the harshest Budgets in decades, as he attempts to grapple with the bloated public-sector debt legacy left by Labour. Sources close to Mr Osborne said this week's emergency Budget had been finalised by Friday, breaking with the tradition of last-minute tinkering under Gordon Brown., says the Independent on Sunday.George Osborne's emergency budget on Tuesday will offer new firms in Britain's run-down regions a £900m tax break to hire workers, as the government seeks to boost private sector job creation in parts of the country most vulnerable to public spending cuts. The chancellor will seek to temper his austerity package by announcing that any company set up outside London, the south-east or the eastern region will not have to pay employer National Insurance contributions (NICs) for its first year in business, writes the Observer.Jim Schiro, the former chief executive of Zurich Financial Services, has emerged as a candidate to replace the Prudential chairman, Harvey McGrath, if the former Man Group boss bows to investor pressure and quits, reports the Independent on Sunday.BP is preparing to sue its main partner in the leaking Gulf of Mexico oil field for its share of clean-up costs after the company, Anadarko, said BP's behaviour revealed "gross negligence" and that the ­accident was preventable, according to the Sunday Telegraph.As BP reels from its toughest week yet since the sinking of the Deepwater Horizon rig, investors warn that the longer-term outlook for the embattled company is likely to worsen. Even as the share price bounced towards the end of last week - at a softening of President Obama's "boot-on-neck" rhetoric, after the company agreed to pay $20bn into an escrow account to fund compensation claims - shareholders point out that BP's liabilities remain unquantifiable, hobbling oil production for years, says the Independent on Sunday.The BSkyB board is to demand assurances from News Corporation that it will not allow what has been described as a "Foxisation" of its successful services before it recommends any deal with Rupert Murdoch for a full takeover of the broadcaster, writes the Sunday Telegraph.Britain's new Tory-Lib Dem coalition government is unlikely to help struggling mid-size companies, according to a survey by the Chartered Institute of Management Accountants (Cima), reports the Independent on Sunday.The government drive to slash the fiscal deficit could reignite the debate over foreign control of major UK infrastructure as ministers start the sale of the £1.5bn High Speed One rail link this week - with France's Groupe Eurotunnel and Australia's Macquarie bank among those tipped to bid, according to the Observer.Top shareholders in Brit Insurance, the Lloyd's insurer, have urged the firm's management to negotiate with Apollo, the US private equity firm, which earlier this month tabled a £770m bid, for an improved offer, says the Independent on Sunday.All food served in the UK's hospitals, schools and prisons will have to conform to British farming and manufacturing standards under a major Government initiative to improve the nation's health and boost the struggling agricultural sector, writes the Sunday Telegraph.Virgin Bank, which entered the high street lending market earlier this year, has slapped a prohibitive 70 per cent loan-to-value maximum on customers looking to take out a mortgage, according to the Independent on Sunday.John Browett, the chief executive of the electronics group DSG, will tell the market if his firm has enjoyed a World Cup bounce, when he reports preliminary results on Thursday. Retailers such as DSG, which operates through the Dixons brand on the high street, and Kesa, which runs Comet and also reports this week, have been offering cut-price deals to lure in new customers looking to watch the football from South Africa in HD, reports the Independent on Sunday.