A regional daily has pledged that crime will be presented “more sparingly” in its pages after admitting it was “getting it wrong” on coverage of the issue.
The Liverpool Echo has reviewed the way it reports criminal matters as part of a month-long consultation with readers ahead of the newspaper’s relaunch on Monday.
Following feedback about the amount of crime in the paper, it has now pledged to stop what it termed the “glorification of gangsters” and provide more of an alternative to “the staple diet of violence and mayhem.”
Revealing the change in policy in an editorial comment, executive editor for live news David Bartlett admitted: “We’re getting it wrong.”
The review was part of the #TellAli project, undertaken by editor Alastair Machray over the past few weeks as the paper gears up for next week’s relaunch.
The chief constable of Merseyside told the paper it would “struggle” to fill its pages without police help, while comedian and actor Neil Fitzmaurice has also criticised the amount of crime stories in the paper.
Wrote David: “On quiet days, when there isn’t much happening (and yes we do have them) our default position has been to splash crime on the front page.
“But what you’ve told us in the #TellAli campaign is that this approach has eroded confidence in the Echo and in the city she serves. What we are gaining in short-term sales lifts we are losing in long-term loyalty.
“You’ve told us you want the Echo to think more broadly; to take a harder look at the positive things that are happening and find an alternative to the staple diet of violence and mayhem.
“To be fair to the Echo team here in Old Hall Street many of them have been telling Ali that for a while now. We are over reliant on crime.”
As a result of the #TellAli project the Echo has already promised a review of football coverage after complaints from supporters of Everton FC over perceived bias by the paper towards Liverpool FC, while a more comprehensive entertainment listings section will also appear in the new-look paper.
A questionnaire undertaken by readers revealed 73pc felt the Echo’s crime stories were “sometimes a bit over-the-top”, while 58pc felt the paper was “a bit old fashioned and stuck in the past”.
Added David: “You’ve also been telling us you’ve got concerns about the glorification of gangsters. There is a fine line between covering the lives and sins of crime bosses, and the creation of cult heroes.
“We accept this feedback and we will amend our mindset accordingly. We need to get back on the right side of that fine line.
“Crime will still feature in the pages of the Echo. And sometimes on the front page. That is simply part of the responsibility that comes with covering any large city. Crime is part of life.”
“It would be a sad day, for instance, when a murder is such a commonplace occurrence that it gets relegated to the inside pages. A murder is rare; it is shocking. Thankfully.
“We have a responsibility to shine a light on appalling crimes in the knowledge that if we don’t, the causes may never be addressed. We have a responsibility to the victims of crime to make sure their voices are heard.
“We should not, and will not, portray Liverpool through rose-tinted glasses. But crime isn’t everything and we must present crime more sparingly and more thoughtfully.”
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I don’t know about anyone else, but I now feel I have all the information I ever needed about the Echo’s crime content angst. Can we move on? The Echo can also free up reporting time for local non-crime stories by not policing the rest of the nation’s passing references to anything Liverpudlian.
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searingly honest. We got it wrong. How many times do you see that from hacks or newspaper execs. Wonder if desperately under-staffed papers short of a splash but with a cops handout handy will follow suit?
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Hope that doesn’t mean more clickbait & listicles!
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Agreed. If the self-obsessed Echo spent less time gazing at its own navel and more time writing stories it might not have to fall back on police police releases all the time. Can we now #IgnoreAli for a while? Peter Barron must be feeling very neglected.
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So, exactly how will the Echo fill its pages and website now? Oh yes, more listicles and shareable videos taken on iPhones.
Trinity Mirror is shot, and the Echo can ask its readers all it wants about the content they want, but the paper and website are dead men walking. (***insert more cliches here)
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Absolutely – on both counts.
Bartlett’s ramblings read like a (not very good) think-piece from an in-house mag.
Clearly, if he gets the bullet in TM’s latest round of cuts, he won’t be going into speech-writing.
Bizarre though that any paper should ignore the concerns of its staff – but decide to change after asking readers for their views.
However, can’t understand what ‘glorification of gangsters’ means. A link or par of explanation would have been useful.
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God, give it a flipping rest will yer?
You’ve been doing it wrong all these years.
You’re sorry.
We get it.
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Fair play to the Echo for saying it. It’s been a common complaint among readers for years. There’s so much going on in the city politically and socially that there’s an enormous wealth of stories to get its teeth into, if I never read anouther line about Coleen Rooney’s ear muffs again it’d be too soon.
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Give credit where credit is due. The Echo is listening to its readers. Mostly it’s redesign after redesign with little thought for content on papers. The Echo is making a major effort.
Contrary to the view of Observer, I say, Never Stop Trying to improve the product.
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What’s this about Coleen Rooney’s ear muffs? Sounds like a good read….
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Dear Liverpool Echo,
Please let it go. We’ve heard enough about your self-flagellating, doe-eyed appeals for lost readers to come back and love you again.
You’re turning into that Harry Enfield sketch with the German lad who ‘wants to apologise for the actions of my country during the Second World War’.
It’s over. We’re over it. Are you?
Sincerely,
Ms Grey.
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Oh gawd. What an almighty mess the newspaper industry is in. Can’t bear to read the local rag I used to love. Kids who were making shapes not loñg ago now calling themselves journalists. Crazy stuff indeed.
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I do enjoy the comments section here. Perhaps if this sort of project had been done earlier in newsrooms across the country then the double digit declines in print may have been held off a little. For years we have been forgetting a very basic rule…give the people what they want. We gave them what we thought they wanted and patted ourselves on the back saying how marvellous we were. Now with real analytics we can actually see what people want and read and take the guesswork out of it. Instead of taking the easy option and knocking the echo for doing this perhaps other titles would be well served to follow suit. And we wonder why we are out of touch
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I can’t understand all the anti-Echo posts on here relating to this particular story – a country in denial I think – ALL newspapers are guilty of this, and with so many of them now printed the day before it’s actually irresponsible to run crime stories as splashes or page leads because things might have moved on considerably.
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I always find the results of these types of surveys quite interesting in that they usually contradict what readers actually look at online, if not in the paper.
When I was working on my local daily, we’d periodically do “ask the reader” type of stuff and they’d always say they wanted less doom and gloom and more good news.
Then, whenever we did a story about a murder, car crash or violent crime of any description, the web stats would be through the roof. The numbers for nice, community stories would be, to put it mildly, comparatively low.
I’m not sure if that’s just because the more juicy stories act as clickbait or if readers are in denial about what they actually want to read.
After all, if someone asked you in the street, you wouldn’t say “I love a good murder!”
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