Mayor of London Boris Johnson today joined the attack on council newspapers calling them a “ludicrous waste of money.”

In an exclusive interview with a South London weekly, he described local authority publications as a “very real threat to the democratic process” and claimed that without independent local newspapers, the country risked entering “the dark days of partial news management.”

Mr Johnson’s comment follow yesterday’s report by the Audit Commission which said the money being spent on council newspapers was “not unreasonable.”

After the report was published, Trinity Mirror chief executive Sly Bailey branded it “a complete waste of time” and called on ministers to intervene directly to curb the freesheets.

Mr Johnson spoke out in an interview with the News Shopper which circulates in the South London boroughs of Lewisham and Greenwich.

The Newsquest-owned weekly’s editor Richard Firth has recently published a hard-hitting editorial highlighting what he sees as the pro-Labour bias of Greenwich council’s newspaper, Greenwich Time.

Mr Johnson told the paper: “Council produced newspapers are a ludicrous waste of money and a very real threat to the democratic process, which is why I instantly scrapped Ken Livingstone’s self-serving propaganda sheet, The Londoner, saving £2.9m of council tax payers’ money a year to be spent on, amongst other things, 10,000 trees.

“We simply cannot afford to find that we’ve suddenly arrived in a future where independent local newspapers cease to exist and the local council paper is all there is to go on.

“Some of London’s independent local papers have been holding the executive to account for over a hundred years and too many of these valuable publications are already closing.

“Without them we face dark days of partial news management.”

Meanwhile a London council has accused Ms Bailey of failing to acknowledge the financial benefits to Trinity Mirror of the print contracts for some of the council titles.

Hackney council is one of several London authorities whose publications are printed at the publisher’s Watford plant.

A council spokesman said: “While local newspapers might not get the traditional advertising they once did from councils, the newspaper industry is benefiting in other ways, such as through print contracts with local authorities.

“In Hackney we have an excellent working relationship with Trinity Mirror who print our council paper and who put a huge amount of effort into pitching for the contract. It seems odd, to say the least, that Sly Bailey so vocally opposes those publications which she is happy to print, and happy to bill us every month for.”

A Trinity Mirror spokesman said in response: “We are highly supportive of both the social and statutory need for councils to communicate with their tax payers and as a major contract printer of newspapers in the UK we can offer highly competitive and cost effective solutions for our clients.

“Our objection is not about councils communicating with their tax payers but the style, content and frequency of these ‘newspapers’.

“During the past few years some councils have changed the format of these publications to a ‘tabloid’ newspaper style to include news, features, property pages, what’s-on guides and sport and to pay for the professional journalists required they are taking on third party advertising. Importantly it is not clear these newspapers would be recognised by a reader as a council publication.

“These propaganda newspapers go far beyond their remit and are a threat to local democracy and the survival of a free and independent press.”

Comments

Rob (26/01/2010 12:47:39)
More double standards – maybe the mayor should get his highly paid team of PR gurus to stop sending press releases to all council newspapers. Come on Boris, show some solidarity to the poor downtrodden Sly Bailey’s of this world. And don’t forget the poor shareholders who have been forced to see newspaper bosses make the difficult choice between underinvestment; cost cutting and complacency – or paying out big dividends. it’s time these media giants were given a helping hand – GOd knows, they won’t/can’t help themselves.

Journo1 (27/01/2010 13:38:59)
Err.. Can’t we trust the public to choose between picking up and reading Council ‘newspapers’ and picking up or buying independent newspapers?

Mike (28/01/2010 14:08:32)
Most council newspapers contain information about accessing public services for residents.
No different between that and all the posters The Mayor of London has on tubes/buses and in advertising!