A free weekly newspaper is set to be axed in a move which will see a regional daily sister title delivered without charge one day a week.
From tomorrow, the Burnley Citizen will be replaced by a free Burnley edition of the Lancashire Telegraph, which will remain as a paid-for title in the town on other days of the week.
The move comes after seven staff left the Blackburn-based Telegraph last week following a series of redundancies, including a news editor, a photographer and two trainee reporters who cover Burnley.
The redundancy plans were first reported on HoldtheFrontPage last month.
One of the trainees whose jobs were axed, Katie Mercer, will find out tomorrow if she has triumphed in the news journalism category at the NCTJ’s awards for excellence.
Katie, the only reporter on the Telegraph staff to hail from and live in Blackburn, has found alternative employment at another Newsquest-owned daily, the Oxford Mail.
Other roles to have been lost include one full-time and one part-time picture desk assistant, and a full-time librarian, while the Telegraph will not be replacing recently vacated graphic artist and education reporter positions.
A number of subbing jobs were also lost at the title earlier in the year as part of Newsquest’s transfer of much of its production operation to a hub in Newport.
Under the latest proposals, an additional 10,000 copies of the Telegraph will be distributed across Burnley “via selected outlets and town centre locations” on Thursdays.
The strategy will not affect the Blackburn edition of the paper.
In an announcement sent to staff, Newsquest North West managing director Nick Fellows said: “This is an exciting move, with a significant increase in audience potential for the Telegraph.
“As a result of this strategy, the weekly free Citizen title will cease to be published in print. On all other days of the week, the Lancashire Telegraph Burnley edition will remain a paid for product.”
Chris Gee, the National Union of Journalists’ Blackburn FoC, said: “This announcement comes less than two days after two reporters, a news editor and a photographer dedicated to the Burnley edition of the paper, along with three other key members of editorial staff were made redundant by Newsquest.
“Around 20 news professionals, the vast majority talented and experienced journalists, have lost their jobs in the Blackburn newsroom since the start of October.
“While the NUJ applauds attempts by Newsquest to increase the circulation of the Lancashire Telegraph in Burnley, it is impossible to see in the face of these brutal cutbacks, how remaining staff, already working untold unpaid hours beyond their contracts, can continue to maintain the quality of the paper we are so proud to work for.”
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Nick Fellows said: “This is an exciting move…”
A paper axed and journalists made redundant. How in the name of God can this be called exciting?
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Yet another use of the word ‘exciting’ to describe job cuts, declining editorial standards and increasingly desperate strategic decisions. Well done to Nick Fellows for his imaginative choice of adjective.
It’s not mentioned in the article, but it’s only 18 months or so ago that the Telegraph expanded its reporting team for the paper’s ‘exciting’ relaunch – with more pages and higher cover price – which caused a catastrophic drop in sales.
Morale in the Telegraph newsroom must be at an all-time low as the remaining staff contemplate what ‘excitement’ their bosses are planning for them next.
Surely an ‘exciting’ switch to weekly publication can’t be too far away?
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I’m beyond baffled by this. Having ‘Knowledge’ of the operation at the LT, I can truly say those made redundant are the lucky ones. The relentless pressure on staff will not ease, and I can only imagine how bad it will be the day before each free edition. I cannot imagine how morale must be. My heart goes out to some great journalists who remain.
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I get so sick of hearing MDs use words like ‘exciting’ and ‘potential’ as a veil to draw across what’s really happening.
We always had a copy of McNae’s to hand in the newsroom. Do the directors all have some kind of handbook packed with these ridiculous phrases that they just pass around?
“McNae’s Maniacal Expressions For Managing Directors To Come Across As Slightly Delusional Rather Than Utterly Careless With The Business, anyone?”.
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The language these newspaper executives use is right out of George Orwell.
The towns mentioned, Blackburn and Burnley, have produced first-class journalists over the years who earned a dedicated following from readers of all ages and social backgrounds.
Nowadays this readership loyalty is all down the drain thanks to the suits.
A hub in Newport…just who do they think they are kidding?
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So right Outcast.
your comment ‘exciting’ relaunch – with more pages and higher cover price – which caused a catastrophic drop in sales.’ reminds me so much of JP. My paper carried fewer stories in its relaunched edition than the week before! Classic. Staff begged JP bosses to mess up the paper. They did it anyway.
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sorry, I meant begged bosses NOT to mess up the paper! I need a sub editor. Anyone seen one?
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Try Newport!
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A lot of MDs speak(write) like this because they are really only jumped-up ad reps who know nothing about journalism and care a lot less.
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I’m reminded of the condemned man who said ‘This is exciting’ as the executioner put the hood over his head. We all know what happened next.
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I once worked for a paper that was taken over by Newsquest.
They sent a tw*t in scarlet braces to lecture us on the ‘exciting’ times ahead. He was a whizz at computerised presentation and a master of management double-talk. The staff were not fooled. For all his dazzle he was clearly a donkey.
That paper is now a mere husk of its former self. The news editor doubles as a district reporter, the editor for all I know makes the coffee and sweeps the floors, the ad manager is presumably head honcho, while the photographers….you’ve guessed it, they all went years ago.
Inevitably, the paper is p*sspoor and circulation is heading south faster than the Orient Express but, hey, hold on long enough and you may get a redundancy cheque. Happy times!
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Not only do they know nothing about journalism they care a lot less about ensuring the future of the newspapers they profess to be excited about. To use such language when they are making people redundant is insensitive in the extreme.
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Regional and weekly newspapers have suffered a decline in readership for years mainly due to giving away its core ingredient, news. For years journalists enjoyed this new medium as it was giving them many more readers for their stories, but the commercial staff were quickly aware that there was little revenue in this new medium. However, in the main, their view was ignored. Although the main source of income from the regional press is advertising the salaries of salespeople were always eclipsed by editorial employees, who thought they, the ad staff, were beneath them and didn’t recognise that without them there would have been very few profitable newspapers. Now the pendulum has swung and the sales staff are looked upon as the main providers in the industry who are going to save newspapers from extinction, at least in the medium term. How many times had a story been published slagging off an advertiser without the reporter consulting or informing the sales department? The argument goes along the lines of we need to tell our readers about these ‘bad people’ which, on occasions, may be true. However in most cases the story is run without any thought for the loss of revenue to the company. Ads are dropped by editors, again in many cases, without informing the ad department. Front page ads, which were a huge earner were taken off without any thought for the drop in revenue that would follow.
Now we have a nightmare scenario where we are giving the news away, print revenue is dropping, but it’s over 80% of ad spend, digital readership is booming but the associated revenue is small. Many journalists or former journalists on this website are blaming everybody else for the situation we are in.
Perhaps we may not be so deep in the mire if journalists had cooperated with the ad department in revenue generation and acknowledged that the advertisements, which pay all our wages,are just as important as the editorial content and the people who work in sales are at least the equal of editorial staff.
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Understand your points It’s Not All Over but if nobody buys the product because it is not interesting enough they you achieve the same net effect, ie falling sales, revenues, and closures.
The reason people buy local newspapers – and they employ journalists – is because there is a level of impartiality and inquisitiveness which the reader expects.
If readers get wind of the fact that newspapers won’t run certain stories because whoever runs the local bakery might get upset, you lose that connection.
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I agree largely with It’s not all over, but would make the following points, having asked local people I know who are not connected with the media:
The sad fact is that more and more people are not interested in what goes on around them enough to buy a newspaper. Most people are busy with their work and when they come home in the evenings they just want to relax. More than ever we are a nation of telly watchers (or online stuff etc). I think this has made people much less parochial than they once were and with so much on screen who could care less about a chip pan fire down the road or similar trivialities as reported in so many weeklies?
The downside is that there is much less community involvement, people spend their time in their own little bubbles.
Interest in English politics has gone down the drain. Heckling at election time used to be a highlight of the voting process. Nowadays few people bother because the perception is that nothing can be changed because the difference between the parties is only fag paper thick.
Teachers at my local school are doing a big drive trying to get pupils to read newspapers and books.
I asked the teachers if any of them ever read their local paper. Not one of them does.
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`Katie, the only reporter on the Telegraph staff to hail from and live in Blackburn’ . . .
So much for employing local people with local knowledge and contacts . . . what a crass decision to get rid of her.
I always thought that `local’ was the name of the game to attract readers
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There are many papers with no local editorial staff at all. And it shows however hard they work. Local knowledge is everything on local papers.
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