‘All news starts off local’
By Andrew Grant-Adamson • Apr 26th, 2009 • Category: JournalismHenry Porter has a nicely evocative piece in the Observer today about life on a regional paper in the 1970s and some important things to say about the importance of local papers. He writes:
All news starts off local. Without reporters dropping into a court case, pestering the manager of an NHS trust, sitting through an inquest or badgering the local bobbies, democracy and accountability in Britain would not be possible. Local news, effectively local newspapers and their websites, is essential to our society and don’t let anyone tell you that the propaganda rags produced by local councils are a substitute for independent newspapers that can run campaigns, concentrate their fire on a council or simply cover the local sheepdog trials.
In the paper’s media pages, Peter Preston is also writing about the local press and supporting the idea of regional monopolies.
“Let Archant keep East Anglia safe,” he writes. I am not sure I agree. In the ten years I have lived in an area where Archant already has a near monopoly I have seen a decline in quality even before the latest cuts.
Andrew Grant-Adamson is Andrew Grant-Adamson is a journalist who now teaches a new generation of writers, subs and editors at the University of Westminster.
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