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Newsquest defends subbing hub as weekly switches over

Regional publisher Newsquest has defended its controversial decision to move production of its Yorkshire and North-East titles to South Wales as the first paper switched over to the new system.

This week’s Gazette & Herald in North Yorkshire hit the streets yesterday after becoming the first of the group’s titles in the region to move production to the new central unit in Newport.

The plans have proved bitterly controversial with up to 25 subbing roles in Bradford, York and Darlington at risk and led to a one-day strike by National Union of Journalists members at the three centres last week.

But editors have described some of the union’s comments about the new system as “a lot of nonsense” and have declared themselves “delighted” with the results of the Gazette & Herald move – although the union claims it went “far from smoothly.”

This week's edition of the Gazette & Herald, the first title to be produced on the new Newsquest system

Steve Hughes, managing editor of Newsquest York, said journalists on the weekly paid-for are now working on the PCS digital content management system Knowledge.

The new system is set to be introduced across Newsquest’s titles in Yorkshire and the North East, including the Press in York, the Telegraph & Argus in Bradford and the Northern Echo in Darlington.

Said Steve:  “We are delighted with the result. The Gazette is the first title in Yorkshire and the North East to move to the new system and the first issue looks great.”

“It’s a really well thought out system which is fully integrated with the web and allows our journalists to work much more efficiently, doing what they do best which is getting out and about and covering local news and sport.

“Part of the production process is now carried out at the central unit but all our reporters, photographers and sports staff are based on the patch and all key editorial decisions are made locally.

“There’s a been a lot of nonsense said and written about our papers being edited in Wales which is mischievous and simply not true.”

Jo Kelly, editor of the Gazette, added: “I’m very pleased with today’s paper and don’t think our readers will notice any change.

“However, now that production is fully integrated with the internet, our reporters will have more time to concentrate on writing and covering events in the communities we serve.”

However NUJ Northern and Midlands organiser Chris Morley said: “We have heard that, despite Newsquest’s spin and backslapping, the production of the first edition of the weekly Gazette and Herald in York under the new system went far from smoothly and was mired in errors and confusion right up to and including the day the paper was produced.

“The templates for the paper were the wrong size, despite the dimensions having been sent to the centralised unit many weeks in advance.

“Staff, who already work long hours, had to come into the office the weekend before publication to deal with problems and had to work many hours beyond their usual finishing time on Tuesday, production day, to ensure the paper got out.

“A training manager and a full complement of IT staff were also required to oversee matters, which is surely not sustainable.

“If this is how Newsquest sees the smooth production of a title, it raises serious concerns. We are deeply worried about its response, as it does not bode well for future production of daily titles.

“Our fears, and those of editorial staff at Newsquest, have not been allayed at all by the evidence so far –if anything, they have increased.”

The NUJ claims ten subbing jobs are at risk in Darlington, ten in Bradford and five in York as a result of the changes.

34 comments

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  • February 27, 2014 at 10:47 am
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    Hahahahahahahahaaaaaaa!! Comedy gold. This is a joke, right?

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  • February 27, 2014 at 10:52 am
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    The ‘first issue’ looks dreadful! I’ve seen better looking front pages created in Microsoft Publisher by pupils on a school newspaper.

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  • February 27, 2014 at 11:26 am
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    Hmmm. Nice to have seen it go smoothly, apart from the wrong-size templates, staff being called in the weekend before publication, staff having to work hours past their usual going-home time on production day, the last-minute ‘fixes’ and makeshift solutions to problems and the squad of IT and training staff needed to keep an eye on everything.

    And that’s just for one edition of one paper. The Gazette staff did an amazing job given what they had to deal with. This complacency, arrogance, blind-eye turning and revisionism by Newsquest is shocking, if predictable.

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  • February 27, 2014 at 11:39 am
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    Incidentally, I thought Newsquest managers really hated seeing things about the internal workings of their newspapers appearing on Hold The Front Page?

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  • February 27, 2014 at 11:58 am
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    The sad thing is, I work with these people and they actually believe what they are saying. Black is white and white is black. Enforced resignations are not compulsory redundancies. Circulation is plummeting but it’s good for the future. That’s not an iceberg, it’s a momentarily displaced mass of solidified water. The unions are spreading misinformation.
    Yesterday’s ABC figures prove beyond doubt – if it ever required proving – that Newsquest’s policies and business strategy are dragging everyone, including Hughes and Kelly, into an abyss. And the saddest thing is that if they – along with Barron and Warne in Darlington – had a single ounce of journalistic integrity left they would do something about it. But it requires less effort to take the easy decisions and go with the flow, to dismantle their newspapers, chop the legs off the staff and maintain an untouchable band of executives who can reassure each other with their illogical arguments.

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  • February 27, 2014 at 12:39 pm
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    Based on that front, it’s terrible and looks like it took about three minutes to throw together.

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  • February 27, 2014 at 12:49 pm
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    Having been working with knowledge for several months now I can tell it is hated by most editorial staff.

    Fully-integrated with the web my fanny. Most reporters have given up using it to put stuff up on the web and just carry on using Martini.

    The paper is severely diminished because of Knowledge’s restrictiveness and whats more reporters are spending more time at the computer rather than out on patch, not less.

    That’s because most of the jobs a sub would do have been transferred to the reporter and news desk.

    Several months on and the paper is still riddled with mistakes because the subs in Newport don’t have the time to handle the work load and don’t know the paper.

    The only people it is good news for are the publishers.

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  • February 27, 2014 at 1:53 pm
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    Usual lot of drivel from people with an axe to grind, I see

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  • February 27, 2014 at 2:10 pm
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    I dunno about the merits of this Welsh hub thingy, but by any measure that is one grim front page.

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  • February 27, 2014 at 2:36 pm
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    Subbing man from Newport. That untarnished gem of wit didn’t actually contribute to the discussion. Tell us about your work at Newport. It must be the direct opposite of what we have been hearing. On good money are you? Got the strength of a union, have you? Easy life, have you? Tell us.

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  • February 27, 2014 at 3:06 pm
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    To be fair, the most poorly designed thing on the front page is that Rix advert.

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  • February 27, 2014 at 3:42 pm
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    That front page is appalling. The blurbs are awful. There is no incitement to pick up the paper.
    The picture of Claudia is relegated to a small spot at the bottom of the story and, I assume it’s, Claudia’s Dad’s pic has been cropped so badly it had no impact whatsoever.
    Subbing to templates is a joke.

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  • February 27, 2014 at 6:10 pm
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    Shouldn’t What’s on eight pages of arts and leisure have a question mark at the end? After all, it is a question unless you put some punctuation after the word on. Perhaps a colon is called for.

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  • February 27, 2014 at 6:14 pm
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    The Rix advert is lacking a vital piece of information – an address. I can’t see this advert being very effective for the company.

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  • February 27, 2014 at 9:07 pm
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    Let’s cut to the point here. I’ve been working on this system for several months now too. It’s dumbed-down subbing by numbers, which is allowing newsquest to employ grads straight out of uni with no journalistic experience or ability on cheap wages which are largely funded by the Welsh Assembly. It has turned the papers into vastly inferior, amateur-looking tat. But all NQ gives a toss about is the fact it is cheap and has allowed them to lay off dozens of experienced, talented design subs, saving a packet on salaries into the bargain.

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  • February 28, 2014 at 9:26 am
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    Personally, I think the ad is the best part of the front page! What utterly uninspiring blurbs and terrible photo cropping. Looks like it has been produced by a child on work experience. Couldn’t some colour have been added, so the pets, property and what’s on looked different from each other? How anyone be “delighted” by this beats me.

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  • February 28, 2014 at 10:37 am
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    I can feel the cynicism and bitterness in that front page. It’s real bare minimum of effort stuff – which I suspect reflects the mood of the people who produced it. I’m sure they could do a lot better if they felt inclined. The Rix ad is the best thing on there.

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  • February 28, 2014 at 11:57 am
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    The G&H is my paper. It’s where I started out in newspapers long ago and it’s where I was swiftly put in line by readers if anything was out of place. Though I’ve moved on to other places since, it’s where I was taught the importance of being local.

    The readers used to call the G&H The Bible, because anything that you needed to know was inside. The subs not only handled the news but long strings of community copy – be it village pump news such as WI reports or obituary reports full of names of those attending through to the vast amounts of local sports copy from the typewriter of league top man Keith Sales. You really had to know your stuff, as the area the paper served was very specific. Stray outside the perceived readership borders and people would soon ask what you’re doing reporting on Easingwold or Driffield instead of Hovingham or Pickering.

    To see it be the first moved to Newport pains me immensely. So much so that I contacted friends still living in the area who bemoaned the current state of the paper. It’s not the same, one said, it’s full of York Press material copied over. And now here it is with a dog’s dish of a front page, boasting a lousy headline that fails to catch the tragedy of not knowing what has happened to a missing relative. The pictures look crammed into place, the bottom of the article is raggedly misaligned, the boosts are insipid and management is calling it a job well done.

    This is truly a sad day in my eyes, I shall dearly miss the G&H I was once proud to serve.

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  • February 28, 2014 at 12:24 pm
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    The front is indeed very poor. But it’s the ironic Rix advert juxtaposition that gets me: “Local, independent, family owned…”

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  • February 28, 2014 at 12:28 pm
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    Can someone tell me if I’ve got this right because I can’t quite get me ‘ed around it.

    Newsquest introduced massive increases in the price of under-pressure products during one of the worst and most prolonged slumps in history and then the inevitable happened. Coupled with this they sack the very people who do the things that make the products more appealing to customers and make it more likely that they will buy the products.

    Then they start to move vital parts of the production out of their local areas and hand it over to stressed-out, inexperienced people hundreds of miles away who have no knowledge of said local areas. We all know what that leads to.

    Now, I’m no business guru but this sounds like some kind of vision straight out of the madhouse. Or am I missing something here? On the face of it you wouldn’t put these people in charge of a kid’s piggy bank never mind a huge media corporation.

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  • February 28, 2014 at 2:13 pm
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    for JP now read Newsquest, heaven help them. few remaining hacks spending more time doing production jobs than finding good LOCAL well written stories. Only kids under 30 think this is proper journalism. The rest should know better.
    As for the readers, the dreadful drop in sales in both firms speaks volumes about the lack of real boardroom talent.
    It’s digital or bust, folks.

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  • February 28, 2014 at 2:27 pm
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    What did the paper look like before the switch, and doesn’t the move to a new system always cause additional work initially?

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  • February 28, 2014 at 2:54 pm
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    Can someone tell me if I’ve got this right because I can’t quite get me ‘ed around it.

    Newsquest introduced massive increases in the price of under-pressure products during one of the worst and most prolonged slumps in history and then the inevitable happened. Coupled with this they sack the very people who do the things that make the products more appealing to customers and make it more likely that they will buy the products.

    Then they start to move vital parts of the production out of their local areas and hand it over to stressed-out, inexperienced people hundreds of miles away who have no knowledge of said local areas. We all know what that leads to.

    Now, I’m no business guru but this sounds like some kind of vision straight out of the madhouse. Or am I missing something here? I wonder if some brave soul spoke up for common sense when this death-wish blueprint was plonked onto the table.

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  • February 28, 2014 at 3:48 pm
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    They’re a couple of months into the use of Newport copy editors (NOT subs) at the Worcester News and associated weeklies, and I’m reliably informed things have got no better at all. In fact, it’s claimed one day recently the editor there had to sub a whole load of pages himself because at 3pm Newport turned round and said they could do no more as they were too busy.

    By the way, I wonder, Call Me Cynical, if perhaps the Rix advert doesn’t need a postal address because people have to order by phone, email or online, and can’t walk in off the street?

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  • February 28, 2014 at 3:53 pm
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    Also, if you look carefully the three columns don’t line up. Small detail I know, but it just diminishes the product.

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  • March 1, 2014 at 9:55 am
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    I agree submerged … at a time when the titles need to look better than ever, if not to gain readership (we are lead to believe there is demand for that online) at least to attract advertisers, Newsquest, and certainly JP, have deemed the very staff that could achieve this superfluous. JP’s decision to outsource means the ads are at best okay, but there are more shockers and no good ads. A well designed ad adds enormously to the look of a page or a feature. With the Tour de France heading to Yorkshire in July, that region, in particular, has huge advertising potential, and whilst the one off okay ads will no doubt please the management, repeat advertisers are what they could have had with ad campaigns that work for the client, not just fill space.

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  • March 3, 2014 at 2:14 pm
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    To Lister.
    What’s the point? You don’t want to hear any contributions from us, they won’t agree with your preconceptions. This way of working has its advantages, provided everyone understands it requires flexibility on the part of the people trying to fill the template. It’s not like a design system – the news has to fit the template, not the other way around. Take the front page everyone is moaning about – it would have looked a lot better if they had used a horizontal pic of the father, instead of shoehorning a vertical in there. Once upon a time snappers had to get both – doesn’t that happen any more?

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  • March 3, 2014 at 6:25 pm
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    That front page is the dullest I’ve seen in a long time. It’s unimaginative, poorly headlined and uses inappropriately cropped pictures. I know the kind of pressure everyone’s under because I’ve lived it. Towards the end of my Newsquest days I just stopped enjoying a job I’d previously put my heart and soul into. And I’ve got the awards to prove it. When Newsquest made me an offer I had to refuse it was, quite frankly, a relief. The subbing will improve as staff get used to the new system. But Newsquest is rearranging the deckchairs on the Titanic here and elsewhere. I sincerely hope the local and regional press finds a way out of its current situation. But for that to happen the people making the decisions need to understand that their papers aren’t just products to be churned out on a production line. They need personality and wit alongside well informed journalism produced by motivated and skilled staff. If the above example is anything to go by, all that is in short supply. After many years if hard work turning my post-journalism life around I have a new career now. I can only advise Newsquest journalists to plan their exit strategies now. Trust me, when the time comes, and it will, they’ll be better off in the long run. Good luck everyone.

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  • March 3, 2014 at 8:17 pm
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    Tin Tin, we could well be in the same newsroom. Knowledge is a dogs dinner.

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  • March 4, 2014 at 4:25 pm
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    For those thinking the first Knowledge front looks good, don’t worry they get progressively worse from here on in.
    The thought, care and pride in page/template design is all but non-existent.
    The system is, to be quite frank, dire – as, I’m afraid, is the standard of subbing on offer. Did I say subbing? I meant copy-editing, because subbing it isn’t.
    You have an entire newspaper of page lead headline gems such as “Team scores goal” and “Woman damages door” to look forward to.
    The idea that Knowledge frees up reporters is utterly absurd.
    Reporters now write stories, order templates, wait for templates, contact Newport to ask for templates to be corrected before being forced to make do with what they have got.
    With that done they then have to apply templates, report the template error using the automated helpdesk, await helpdesk response – sometimes hours – then put the story package on the page, then try to edit the picture on page – the system simply throws the pic into the space and Newport do not touch pics.
    Oh and don’t for one second think that a story package labelled 350 words will be 350 words – to Newport 350 words means somewhere between 120 and 650 words.
    You then have to make sure your story has appeared on the web – with headline and picture – and on the app, then report that two hours after uploading it still hasn’t shown up, etc, etc, etc
    Picture boxes on page do not conform to accepted picture shapes so forget the likes of a standard 6×4 or 4×6 pic, start thinking 3.5×8 or 5x.2.8 or whatever random ratio the template designer used to fit around an ad.
    And yes, Subbing man from Newport, I do have an axe to grind – that axe being that no matter how hard I work, no matter how many extra hours I put in, how well I research and write a story, how much I care and want and hope that what I have done is something I can be proud of, when the printed paper turns up in the shops it still leaves me asking “why do I even bother” every single week.

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  • March 5, 2014 at 9:39 am
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    Subbing man.
    You’re not a “subbing” man really, are you? Anyone who defends this system can not be a subbing man, or a proper journalist. I suspect all you do is slap templates together, regardless of how they look and regardless of what copy or photos come in, and leave the proper journalists (sorry, content managers) to fight a losing battle in trying to sort it all out.
    Either that or you’re in management and want promotion!!
    This system is a mess and was always going to be a mess.

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  • March 5, 2014 at 8:00 pm
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    Much-travelled (you missed the hyphen)…what exactly would you be doing if you were a sub in Newport?

    Telling management the system is a mess?
    Or defending yourself from people like you who fire cheap shots like ‘proper journalist’ and display zero understanding of how the system works?

    Subs don’t choose templates. Subs don’t drop copy/pictures into them. Subs don’t, unless requested to by the papers, get to alter page design after that has happened.
    That’s all down to editors/news editors these days.

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  • March 6, 2014 at 8:05 pm
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    You can tell the commenters who actually have to use knowledge on a daily basis – be they sub or news ed – and those apologists who have allowed this appalling system to be introduced.
    All the editors sitting in their offices who have let this happen should be ashamed…you may still have your jobs for now but look at your legacy.
    I bet you can’t wait to tell your grandkids how you were responsible for the slow death of the local paper.

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