Our local news media is at the heart of community and the first line of defence against corruption in public life. Across the country, thousands of local journalists work tirelessly to hold power to account on behalf of local residents, uncovering truths which powerful decision-makers might prefer to keep hidden.
As more power is devolved to local decision makers, the transparency and scrutiny provided by local journalists will become even more important. Citizens must have full oversight of any plans to change how their local authority governs, and how their money is being spent.
The underlying aim of the English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill to give more power to local communities is laudable. At the News Media Association, we passionately support vibrant local communities served by strong local news media titles.
However, one part of the Bill has caused concern and bemusement within our sector – namely the provision to remove the statutory requirement within the Local Government Act 2000 for communities to be notified of changes to a council’s governance structure through a public notice in a local newspaper. Instead, councils would be free to flag such changes “in a manner they think appropriate”, giving scope for such decisions to be kept entirely secret and buried in the darkest corners of council websites.
This creates a disturbing contradiction within the reforms. On one hand, the government claims it wants to give communities more say in their own destinies. Yet the proposed removal of these types of notices from local papers will do the exact opposite by reducing transparency.
The EDCE Bill will introduce some of the biggest changes to local authorities in England since the Local Government Act 1972 – full transparency is critical to delivering that effectively. Local news media is ideally placed to deliver this scrutiny – titles which are highly trusted and enjoy huge audiences in print and digital.
The local news media sector also takes its role as an independent and trusted platform for public notices very seriously. While millions of people – particularly elderly and vulnerable groups – rely on printed local papers to access public notices, the sector has worked hard in recent years to increase the reach of the notices by leveraging its significant digital audiences.
A major innovation has been the Public Notice Portal – a digital one-stop-shop for all the public notices published in print local newspapers built with funding and expertise from the Google News Initiative. We are immensely proud of this platform which ensures that there are even more ways for the public to access the notices across different platforms, while maintaining the link to an independent news environment which drives engagement and provides scrutiny.
The sector’s public notices offering does not stop there. Because the notices flow through local papers, they are often used as leads for stories by local journalists and covered editorially, ensuring even deeper public engagement. Coverage of local government affairs is right at the core of local media’s public interest journalism.
Recent events in Nottinghamshire have shown in stark terms that local government transparency must be written into law and not left to the discretion of councils. The Reform UK-led council’s now-lifted ban on the local paper there should be taken as a warning of what could happen if transparency is weakened by a relaxation of rules which underpin it. As the leader said in a recent council debate, he would happily do it again.
We are therefore pleased to have gained support of Lib Dem MPs Manuela Perteghella and Caroline Voaden who have tabled an amendment to the EDCE Bill striking out the provisions to remove public notices from local papers. Their defence of local democracy should be applauded.
The Bill is before MPs for Report Stage today and tomorrow and I hope that others rally to their cause. If the amendments are not passed, the Lords will then have the opportunity to purge the Bill of these anti-democratic provisions.
Not content with just one attack on local democracy, the government is also looking removing alcohol licensing notices from local papers – a pointless intervention which many landlords have rejected as a waste of time. The Prime Minister spoke about the vital importance of local journalism for our Journalism Matters campaign earlier this month. Make no mistake – removing public notices from local papers is an attack on local journalism which does not square with these warm words. Ministers need to think again about how best to support the sector.
In the absence of any meaningful support from government for local journalism, we are pleased however that Parliamentarians are willing to stand up in defence of local journalism and local democracy. We encourage others to do so and look forward to working with them as the EDCE Bill progresses through Parliament.
* Owen Meredith is chief executive of the News Media Association. Previously CEO of the Professional Publishers Association, Owen has a wealth of experience both in politics and the media, championing independent and sustainable news media.
Follow @libdemvoice.org on Bluesky
Like us on Facebook
Subscribe to our feed
Sign-up for our daily email digest
Debt-ridden graduates claim they are seen as cash cows
Why non-fiction books need their indexes
Changes in status: Local Elections wrap up
AM
Ben Wood
Ed Sanderson
Jack
5 Comments
Are we just publishing a press release here? Also – hollow laughs all round at ‘ As more power is devolved to local decision makers…’ – all we have seen for the last 40 years is a steady erosion of power and funding at local government level, something we as a party regrettably did little if anything to stop in the coalition government. Quite clearly the latest local government restructure will do nothing to devolve power. It will manage to create the worst of both worlds – much bigger, more remote, councils but still the confusion of two layers with elected Mayors on top – all elected by FPTP. Labour typically silent even on reverting to the crumb of the second vote that they originally introduced.
This does not ring true at all “Across the country, thousands of local journalists work tirelessly to hold power to account on behalf of local residents, uncovering truths which powerful decision-makers might prefer to keep hidden.”
when I was on the council (I retired in 2011) and from what I have seen since, being still very interested, is that the council does a press release about an issue before the decision is actually made, knowing that it will actually be passed. A quote written by the officers for the cabinet member go in. So any speeches at council or committee on the issue, against or even about the proposal is “old news” and not printed. Press releases rarely taken up.
there has been the introduction of local democracy reporters since I retired and they do a job, but given the wide range of meetings only a fraction is covered by them.
in the “olden days” a reporter from each of the local papers was at every meeting and a story done.
As for reporting on the activities of the elected mayor of Tees Valley, the press releases are printed and Private Eye does a good job of reporting what is going on.
I appreciate Owen Meredith’s perspective, which is not one I have heard before. All government, regardless of party, is excessively secretive, even when it’s not in their own interests. It doesn’t help that the press habitually attacks anyone in public office, although it usually goes easy on business and finance. I have not been aware of any investigative local journalism for years now, which is a major factor in the decline of print media. My local paper is one of many owned by the American publisher Gannett, which has an obvious right wing bias and mostly prints articles sent in by interested parties.
It should certainly be the case that councils and mayors should be required to make notices available to the press and online news feeds, which are beginning to mature in some towns. We can not rely on each council to make its own choices, it has to be statutory. The well-funded attack on our democracy certainly needs to be repelled, but I am sorry to say that I do not see local press making a helpful contribution in its current state.
I agree with Owen’s argument and the proposed parliamentary action, but I also take Suzanne’s and John’s point that local press is not what it was. This is due to the loss of advertising revenue and the tendency to group and amalgamate local papers, reducing staffing. For instance here, their offices are no longer in the high street, a short stroll from the Town Hall, but in an industrial esate in another town.
I agree the Public Notice Portal is a good resource. If government wants to subsidise local newspapers it could do so through an independent grant-giving organisation or through the Local Democracy Reporting Service rather than forcing councils (and others) to pay over-the-odds for public notice advertising which, last time I checked, was charged for at a rate substantially more than standard display ads. As long as the notices are published somewhere consistently a good journalist should be able to sift them for leads.