A total of 16 editorial jobs are under threat in a further series of cutbacks at Newsquest-owned newspaper titles announced to staff this week.
The past fortnight has seen a series of job loss announcements at Newsquest regional publishing centres including Bradford, Darlington, Gloucestershire and York.
Now it has emerged that five more roles are under threat at the Oxford Mail, three at the Lancashire Telegraph, one at the Bolton News, and seven at the group’s Wiltshire titles which include the Swindon Advertiser.
Ten of the 16 roles at risk across the four centres are newsdesk and content-editing positions as the publisher seeks to protect frontline reporting roles.
In Oxford, two senior content managers, a news content editor, a photojournalist and a deputy features editor are all under threat of redundancy.
In Wiltshire, the positions under threat include those of news editor, group web editor, three Swindon-based content managers, and a chief reporter and editorial assistant based in Trowbridge.
The Oxford and Wiltshire cutbacks were announced to staff yesterday in separate memos sent by Newsquest Oxfordshire and Wiltshire managing director Chris Moore, which have been seen by HoldtheFrontPage.
He said that while regrettable, the potential reductions meant the company could “continue to invest in frontline reporting roles.”
In Lancashire, the roles of news editor, deputy news editor and two content managers at the Lancashire Telegraph are set to be merged into a single role of audience and content manager.
A sports writer role is at risk in the Bolton newsroom, responsible for the daily Bolton News and newly-launched weekly the Oldham Times.
The latest cutbacks at the two Lancashire titles follow a restructure in October which saw the deputy editors of both leave their roles.
Francesca Winrow, who had been largely responsible for running the LT’s day-to-day news operation while the paper was without an editor between 2015-17, left along with Lynn Ashwell of the News.
A Newsquest spokesman said: “We continue to look for ways to run our business more efficiently in order to ensure that our titles have a sustainable cost structure for the future.
“Due to advancements in technology, a strategic review of the Blackburn Editorial Department has placed the News Editor, Deputy News Editor and two Content Managers at risk of redundancy.
“However, we are proposing to create a new position for an Audience and Content Manager to support the introduction of new editorial workflows.
“Additionally, a strategic review of the Bolton Editorial Department has placed the role of a Sports Writer at risk of redundancy.
“Separate to this, there has been a strategic review of the Newsquest Oxfordshire & Wiltshire region’s editorial departments. This proposal places the following roles at risk of redundancy: the News Content Editor, Deputy Features Editor, Photojournalist and two Senior Content Managers in Oxford, the Group Web Editor, News Editor and three Content Managers at Swindon and a Chief Reporter and Editorial Assistant at Trowbridge.
“Whilst the potential redundancies are regrettable, it means we can continue to invest in front line reporters and content generators which are central to the continued success of our publishing business.”
One member of the Swindon reporting team, who asked not to be named, described yesterday’s announcement as a “huge blow.”
“We are a close-knit team and we’ve been hitting record digital figures in recent months while still managing to keep the inevitable decline in paper sales to a minimum,” he told HTFP.
“The axe appears to have fallen mainly on the production desk. The new technology the management refer to is an increased reliance on ‘write to shape’ software.
“That is fine for routine stories but we pride ourselves on our great supplements and features with their bespoke layouts and exciting presentation. It doesn’t appear that due consideration has been given to how we will continue to deliver these staples of our paper without a production desk.”
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So the Bolton office is responsible for an extra title and loses a member of staff. In what other industry would this happen?
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“we can continue to invest in front-line reporters” – er, am I missing something here? No disrespect to those continuing to toil under the shadow of a dark cloud that statement is a bit like the Govt saying it is continuing to “invest” in the military when we know that whether we wanted to or not, whether we should or not, we would be incapable of launching a dinghy to save the Falklands etc because the troops and equipment are not there.
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Day after day I read of yet more job losses, closures and redundancies from Newsquest here on HTFP yet still they insist there’s no grand plan to reduce staff numbers and these are merely local centres taking local decisions, does Henry F Walker seriously expect us to believe this badly handled year end major job cutting directive is nothing more than a few roles going to allow them to invest in ‘frontline resiurces’ elsewhere?
It’s an insult to the now huge number of staff facing Christmas and the new year jobless and to the intelligence of their once loyal reader and advertising bases.
Staff remaining ( for the time being anyway) at NQ must be worried sick it’ll be their turn next
Shocking and deplorable actions just to offset the damage done by badly managed objectives through the year.
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Just goes to show – all these big newspaper groups are exactly the same – Johnston Press ceased with my employment earlier this year and now I’m seeing all the same things happening again.
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Can I just add that all the jobs losses at Newsquest are entirely coincidental and nothing to do with a corporate strategy of slaughter on the newsfloor to sweeten the bottom line?
Good, I’m glad we’ve cleared that one up.
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Who ever could have guessed, when local newspapers started giving away all their content online for free, that things would turn out this way?
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So a chief reporter, sports writer and deputy features editor are not reporters? I’d have thought the clue was in the job titles of two of these and the third will no doubt be churning out oodles of copy to fill the features pages every week.
Sounds like those in charge see news editors as sitting around drumming their fingers waiting for reporters to turn in copy when the reality is that they will be working as hard as anyone else, leading their teams, identifying stories and ensuring accuracy.
As for getting rid of content editors, I think we’ve all seen the laughable result of that in generic content bundled into newspapers with no thought for the audience, and dreadful errors both in print and online.
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It is that time of year for Bad Santas in the newspaper trade with no happy ending.
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Sad as all these redundancies and title deaths are, they would perhaps be a little more tolerable if the conglomerates responsible were honest and transparent when they make them.
Using terms like “audience and content manager” and “continuing to invest in frontline reporting roles” are nothing more than stuff and nonsense.
We all know it is simply another round of axe-swinging that will inevitably impact adversely on the publications involved. Put the euphemisms away and just come clean, you chiselling, bean-counting journalism-wreckers!
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Will Hung, most of the comments here show some understanding of the complexity of why local newspapers are struggling and the frustration surrounding that. Yours, at best, is silly and misinformed but, at worst, it shows complete ignorance of the wider issues this industry is facing.
Good luck to all affected!
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SWOOSH. That, Oliver, was the sound of my comment going right over your head. Bless.
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Incredibly sad, my thoughts are with all those hardworking employees who have had their Christmas ruined by this news, and to the teams they will leave behind.
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sorry Oliver I am with Will Hung on this.
Giving away news free (not for free, note) has accelerated the decline of newspaper sales without question.
The problem is people will never pay online for the sort of worthy but mostly humdrum material that is a weekly paper staple now.
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Er, Oliver (or should I say Ashley Highfield?) I’m not sure how to break this to you, but Will succinctly put his finger on the precise nub of the problem. Books will be written about this suicidal business strategy in the future – hopefully by people with sharper more insight than you.
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Will Hung is absolutely spot on. Newspaper management wrongly believed they could make a new fortune via on line. Anyone who spoke out against the idea was declared – at the time and, sadly, still now – out of touch.
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All I know is that at a Neighbourhood Watch meeting of the 18 households in my little road recently only two people (both pensioners) said they still buy a weekly paid-for local. Most of the rest said they used to go out and buy but now they view their local online. Also in many districts there is a weekly freesheet delivered house to house or in a rack at shops and so fewer pay about £1 for a weekly local.
Does Oliver understand that’s what is happening?
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Will Hung, again, your comment is pretty pointless so I’ll address the others who seem to have some further thoughts on the matter.
paperboy, teasy, observer and geronimo; we’ve always given our news away free. Take the cost of editorial staff, print and distribution at any local newspaper in the last 20 years and not a single one could have survived on sales alone. We’ve always had a business model reliant on advertising to survive and, up until recent years, that’s been pretty good.
Developments online, way outside of any regional publishers’ control, led to a massive loss in the primary ad revenue streams (Rightmove, Autotrader, Ebay and numerous recruitment platforms).
Regional publishers attempted to reclaim some of that business but, instead of the more sensible, albeit costly, long-term tactic of buying up the competition, they made half-baked efforts to create their own versions or presumed they would prevail regardless. This is where there is some merit in claiming a degree of mismanagement, but hear me out!
It wasn’t just their fault. A business-wide old guard maintained the attitude of ‘don’t put it online and they’ll still buy our papers’ and, if this had continued, I strongly believe that fewer local papers would still be in existence today. A small but potentially useful revenue stream was being ignored by people who either didn’t understand digital or who didn’t care to learn about it.
Many local newspapers continued to lose audience in print and, more importantly, relevance online. The likes of Google search, followed by various social media, were seen as a way to claw back some of that audience. This is when we started to hear the first murmurs of ‘digital first’ but it was still held back corporately by plenty of people who simply wouldn’t buy in.
The game-changer was then the smartphone. People now have news in their pockets with access to social media and company websites directly. This makes printed news even less timely and news stands more irrelevant.
So, after this rather loose summary of some key factors, we come back to advertising. Regional publishers are playing catch-up with their true company-wide digital first strategies and many of the more lucrative digital revenue streams have already gone for good. However, technology is allowing them to grow their audience again and obtain more data about their customers than ever.
Despite this, there is little they could have done to fend of the global giants which now dominate the online advertising industry and picking up the pieces left behind doesn’t come close to the heyday of print advertising.. On top of this, there is an ongoing crisis in print advertising which is eating away at the remaining historic revenue of newspapers so the desire to maintain profit levels means only one thing.
Paid-for online content only works if it’s exclusive or niche. Local newspapers are anything but either of those things.
Geronimo, if not online, do you think those in your Neighbourhood Watch meeting would buy the paper in the hope that there’s something about next door’s shed burglary on Page 24 or do you think they’d rather join a free Facebook group which keeps them informed about every incident, as well as being able to interact with their neighbours?
paperboy, taking all the above into account, I’m not convinced that the provision of free content accelerated the decline of newspapers as much as you might believe. The likes of Facebook and Google have made way more money from information provided by the public than they have from any ‘quality’ local newspaper content.
I stand by the fact that blaming the print industry’s woes on ‘giving away free content’ is ridiculous. New technology plus changes in consumer behaviour and advertising trends are the real culprits!
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I find myself broadly in agreement with your point of view on the whole digital conundrum, Oliver, and am grateful for your many thoughtful contributions to these debates, but I think it’s now probably about time you told us who you are! My guess is that you are probably a former regional editor who “got” digital early on, but was somewhat frustrated by the lack of corporate buy-in at the time (although this has since changed.)
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Sadly our Oliver still fails to completely grasp the real situation. Needs to be fair and above all, accurate. My example mentioning Neighbourhood W was nothing to do with NW but simply illustrated the shrunk number of former local paper readers. Say about ten years ago, many of those residents bought a paper – but not now with free news on screen.
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Geronimo, my initial response was to another comment suggesting that ‘newspapers giving away free content online’ was to blame for the downfall of print. It’s clearly not!
You questioned whether I understood what was happening so I gave you a summary of other major industry factors, citing your example, as a way to answer you.
As for fair and accurate, that’s a separate debate entirely. Do your readers think your paper is fair and accurate? Probably no more so than reading something written by their next door neighbour in a Facebook group! People trust their friends and family way more than they ever will a corporately-owned local newspaper but, as you suggest, that often leads to inaccuracy. The big question is, do people care enough to pay for accuracy? At present, it doesn’t look like it!
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Paul, for me, it’s not about ‘getting’ digital. It’s about traditional print journalists ‘getting’ how things have changed and adapting to that.
For years, they’ve been led to believe that they’ve got to fight for the Page 1 splash and help sell newspapers when, really, their job has always been to inform the most relevant audience in the best way possible.
Journalists provide news and information to be sold or sold into. They don’t sell papers! The job of the organisation is to make money out of whatever the best method of delivery is but, as I’ve often said, I don’t think the regional business model fits well with local needs.
As a result, it’s clear there will be more cuts than necessary and I feel for those affected.
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Oliver: TLDR.
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Will Hung, the ultimate irony. Using a digital acronym to dismiss a discussion about the value of print!
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