A regional daily which has already lost its editor and deputy is facing a raft of additional departures among its senior editorial staff.
Yorkshire Post editor Peter Charlton and his erstwhile deputy Andrew Vine both stood down at the end of July.
Now it has emerged that several other senior staff at the paper have applied for voluntary redundancy under a Johnston Press scheme open to all its Yorkshire journalists.
They include the chief sub-editor, Bob Holmes, news editor Phil Booth and Paul Whitehouse, who is news editor at sister title the Yorkshire Evening Post.
Also on his way is award-winning investigations editor Rob Waugh, the reigning Daily/Sunday Reporter of the Year at the Regional Press Awards.
The paper is currently without an editor, with Sheffield Star news chief Jeremy Clifford not due to take over until the beginning of next month.
Union leaders have voiced concern about the loss of such a clutch of experienced journalists.
Chris Morley, Midlands and Northern organiser for the National Union of Journalists said: “When a paper loses that amount of seniority and experience, questions have to be asked about the company’s commitments to its flagship titles.”
Helen Oldham, managing director of Johnston Press Yorkshire, confirmed that all four had applied for voluntary redundancy but stressed that it may be some weeks or months before they actually leave.
“Whilst we have accepted their applications in principle, no leaving dates have been given yet, so it may well be months rather than weeks before they go,” she told HTFP.
Helen also confirmed that the current spate of departures were not the result of any company restructuring.
She said: “There’s no major restructure planned although it’s inevitable that a new editor will look at the set up with a fresh pair of eyes and may want to make some changes as a consequence.”
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Interesting use of ‘erstwhile’ … one of those quirky media words which appear in print, but which you’ve never heard anyone say.
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Wow – not exactly a vote of confidence in the way things are going, is it.
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The YP can only begin to look worse from now on. With less quality journalism from fewer experienced journalists, less quality advertising from fewer ‘designers’ and fillers of house ads and reader holidays, it’ll end up looking like a morning version of the EP, when in fact they should appear to be different brands for a differing readership. Perhaps JP should be asking staff (fortunate to have kept their jobs until now) why they want to leave. Maybe they don’t want to hear the answers.
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JP’s cost cutting plan to “get the banks off its back” aims to offer VR to tempt those higher paid staff (yet still low by the standards of police, teachers, even bus and lorry drivers!) to bite, thus saving thousands in salaries in the long run.
By doing this, however, years of experience will be lost, with the papers relying on tweets and the “user generated content” it so prizes to fill their pages. No wonder sales are dwindling.
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I picked up a copy of the YEP last month and after not having read it for eons was pleasantly surprised. It looked good and there was plenty of news in it. The YP on the other hand has been on the downward slide for quite a while and just looks dull. I wouldn’t be surprised if these departures lead to editorial mergers. I mean why do you need two news editors for newspapers that both come out on the same day? This is what the bean counters will be thinking.
Lots of newspapers are putting their cover price up in response to falling revenues amid much trumpeting from publishers about more pages, etc and a better quality product. But the truth is you can’t do that with less staff and the quality of your product inevitably declines. What was also rejected as a page lead before – to give an example – now becomes a page lead just because of the sheer numbers of pages that need filling. Readers aren’t daft and notice the difference.
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Are those names the “substantial lieutenants” referred to recently by Steve Dyson?
The ones he said the new editor must make sure he/she keeps hold of?
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