The Manchester Evening News has announced plans to move to a new purpose-built media centre in the heart of the city's expanding Spinningfields business district.

Guardian Media Group, which publishes the MEN, has signed a 22-year lease on a state-of-the-art office complex close to the paper's current headquarters at Deansgate.

MEN editor Paul Horrocks, said: "This is an exciting development for the Manchester Evening News.

"Our new home - the fourth in our history - is only a short distance from our original offices in Brown Street, followed by Cross Street and almost next door to our current Deansgate site.

"The paper's roots are in the city centre and it is right they should remain at the heart of the region we serve.

"Manchester has transformed itself through innovative regeneration - and now we are part of that regeneration process."

The brand new building, which will be situated in Hardman Street, will also house the Manchester Metro News, the northern operation of the Guardian, magazine publisher Diverse Media, and GMG Regional Digital, which publishes www.manchesteronline.co.uk.

Ian Ashcroft, chief executive of the Guardian Media Group Regional Division said: "Manchester has always been the home and heartland of GMG's regional operations.

"In addition to the necessity of the Manchester Evening News being here, the new building secures all the advantages of Manchester to GMG as a business and to our staff, who will be working in a 21st Century building at the centre of a thriving city."

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