A regional daily has been left with no dedicated staff and will be edited almost 30 miles off-patch following its editor’s departure.

Reach plc has confirmed the Burton Mail now has no journalists solely working for the title after its editor Julie Crouch left the business.

Julie, pictured, had been in charge of the Mail from 2017 until last month, when she was among a number of regional editors to depart following group-wide cuts by Reach.

Reach has now confirmed to HTFP that Marc Waddington, who edits Stoke-on-Trent daily the Sentinel and its companion website StokeonTrentLive, now has overall editorial responsibility for the Mail as a result.

Marc is also responsible for the Mail’s county-wide website Staffordshire Live, for which Julie had also retained oversight, as well as Cheshire Live, which lost its editor Frances Barrett in the same round of cutbacks.

There are now no individual journalists listed as working for the Mail on the Staffordshire Live website, although Reach said it shares editorial resources with Cheshire Live and StokeonTrentLive and has its own print resource.

March, Reach placed 426 journalism roles at risk in total with the goal of 192 posts being cut from the workforce.

Other editors to leave the group as a result included Adam Moss, who ran the Leicester Mercury, Coventry Telegraph and Northants Live, the Teesside Gazette’s Ian McNeal and Hull Daily Mail chief Jamie Macaskill.

In a Facebook post written at the time her departure was announced, Julie wrote: “It’s a job I’ve been so proud to do. I’m so grateful to the dedicated team at the Mail for all their support and hard work.

“Over the years I have worked with some amazingly talented and dedicated people. Newsrooms are brilliant places – there’s nowhere like them. There’s too many people to thank individually for all the help and support.

“I’ve received along the way so thank you to all the teams I’ve had the privilege to be part of over the years – what memories.

“I’m off to do something new – not sure what yet but looking forward to the next chapter.”