A council-run newsletter launched over 15 years ago and costing £600,000 a year is facing the axe.

Birmingham City Council's 'Forward' newspaper went out fortnightly to around 400,000 homes and various other locations around the Second City.

But it has not appeared since the council's print and distribution contract with regional publisher Trinity Mirror expired in June.

Now the Birmingham Post, also owned by Trinity Mirror, is reporting that the council's communications director will recommended Forward's permanent closure to cabinet members next month.

A city council spokeswoman told HTFP that the authority was currently looking at its options over the summer to reflect the changing way people consumed their news.

Birmingham City Council first launched its own newspaper in May 1992 but was renamed from The Voice following a change of administration in 2004.

The Birmingham Post says that, in one edition last year, seven photographs of the council's Tory leader appeared on the first eight pages yet a contributed article from the opposition Labour group about the budget had been rejected.

Forward was also criticised for publishing mortgages and loan adverts aimed at sub-prime borrowers which the council admitted had slipped through the net.

This is the latest in a long line of stories about council-run newsletters and what appears to be a changing tide towards their closure, especially by councils with recently-elected new ruling parties.

Earlier this month it emerged that the newly-elected Mayor of Doncaster had called time on the council's seven-year-old newsletter on his first day in office.

And in July Cornwall's new unitary authority has ceased publishing 'Your Cornwall' which ran £250,000 over budget in just 11 months since its inception.