Christmas poll: Choose your favourite press funny of 2009

On HoldtheFrontPage today we are running our nominations for the Top Ten Friday Funnies of 2009, featuring the very best in UK press cock-ups, bizarre news judgements, unintentional double entendres and sheer silliness from the past 12 months.

Now we want your help in choosing the ultimate winner.

The following poll will remain open for the next fortnight and the results will be published on the site early in the New Year.

Click here for a recap on the contenders.

Jan 5 update: Thanks for taking part. The poll is now closed.

O Christmas Tree....

This rather sorry image was captured in a regional press newsroom earlier today. We'll spare the blushes of the newspaper concerned, but the journalist who sent it to us seemed to think it summed up his company's year.....

All in the line of duty….

An Israeli sports reporter got more than he bargained for when he went to cover a basketball match on Tuesday.

Irmi Olmert, the brother of the country's former Prime Minister Ehud, apparently took exception to something the reporter had said on-air on the Channel 5 sports network.

Video footage shows the pair arguing followed by shots of the reporter laid flat out on the court although the punch itself is not filmed.

It's not the first time a reporter has been set upon – all in the line of duty of course – so over to the Daily Mirror website for a video round-up of the Top 10 attacks on reporters caught on camera.

Liveblogging the Society of Editors conference

HoldtheFrontPage is at Stansted today covering the Society of Editors conference, the biggest media gathering of the year. You can follow our live updates via our Twitter feed, Journalism News.

Are local newspapers worth saving?

Most HoldtheFrontPage readers would say yes, of course. But here's an opposing view from the Guardian columnist George Monbiot.

Spot on, Peter

You can say what you like about TV's the X-Factor, but it certainly gets people talking. Last night's decision by Simon Cowell to reprieve talentless twins John and Edward Grimes at the expense of Welsh songbird Lucie Jones has been the main topic of conversation in many offices this morning.

At least one regional editor was so exercised by Cowell's behaviour as to feel the need to blog on it, although Northern Echo editor Peter Barron does preface his remarks with the words: "I know I shouldn't get so worked up about a TV talent show, but...."

Peter goes on to pose the question as to how on earth Cowell can slag off John and Edward throughout the competition and then bottle the chance to vote them off the show.

"Could it possibly have anything to do with the fact that John and Edward are guaranteed to generate more publicity than Lucie and, therefore, had to stay?"

Spot on. But as Vicky Frost in the Guardian points out, such naked displays of cynicism on Cowell's part risk killing the goose that lays the golden egg.

She writes: "Jedward are still totally ridiculous, but have now seen off a rather good earnest X-Factor singer, and count Cowell among their fans. By saving them, Cowell has not only destroyed Jedward's appeal – he has chipped away at the programme's too."

Lowe's big tease

As his one-time deputy Keith Perch recently noted, Mike Lowe was one of the great 'personality editors' of the 1990s, bringing his unique style of journalism to first the Gloucester Citizen, then the Derby Evening Telegraph, and finally the Bristol Evening Post.

After leaving Bristol following a management shake-up at the paper in 2005, Mike forged a new career as a lifestyle magazine editor, but the recent departures of Paul Horrocks from the Manchester Evening News and Marc Reeves and Steve Dyson from the Birmingham Post and Mail gave Jon Slattery the chance to dust off his contacts book and give him a call for a feature about what happens to ex-editors.

The interview, published in the current print edition of Press Gazette but not available online, is a great read, not least Mike's revelation that he once entertained "3am fantasies of assassinating the man (or woman)" who forced him out of his job.

But the really tantalising gem is the bit where Mike reveals he has recently been approached to return to editing on a major regional title.

He said: "I had a phone call from a headhunter only this week inviting me to apply for a significant regional editor's job. It took me about 20 minutes to realise that I wasn't remotely interested. Life moves on."

So which "significant regional title" was it? Well, the only one I can think of that is currently vacant is the MEN. If Mike, a lifelong United fan, was not tempted by that one, then it's clear that nothing is going to lure him back into regional journalism.

The Commons: 'A killer place'

The funeral of former MEN political editor Ian Craig took place in his family's home town of Wrexham yesterday, with many regional lobby figures past and present paying their respects.

So today's obituary by David McKittrick in the Independent was particularly timely.

But I have to say my eyes lingered over a rather sombre paragraph in McKittrick's piece, in which Ian's close friend, Ian Hernon of the Liverpool Echo, laments his premature loss.

"He joins a regiment of pals who never made it to retirement. They include fellow hacks, officials and politicians. The point is that this is a killer place. Long hours, the hothouse atmosphere, stress, the political roughhouse, travelling, separation from families – and, let's be honest, 17 bars – all combine to prevent many making old bones."

Hernon himself penned the Guardian's obituary of Ian published on Monday.

The right to give offence

Tory blogger Iain Dale's connection to the regional press is somewhat tenuous - he writes a column for the Eastern Daily Press - so we didn't carry today's story about the PCC adjudication against him on the main site.

Nonetheless, the commission's decision to reject Mr Dale's complaint against the Daily Mail columnist Ephraim Hardcastle's description of him as "overtly gay" certainly raises some interesting issues.

It's a rather strangely worded judgement. The PCC agrees the article was "uncharitable" and "snippy" but does not accept that the use of the word "overtly" in conjunction with the word "gay" is necessarily pejorative or homophobic.

It goes on to say: "While people may occasionally be insulted or upset by what is said about them in newspapers, the right to freedom of expression that journalists enjoy also includes the right - within the law - to give offence."

Dale himself, who had initially complained that the piece was "snide" and objectionable, has been fairly restrained in his comments about the adjuducation.

Writing on his blog, he states tersely: "I'm disappointed, but I can't say I am surprised."

Farewell to a great regional press journalist

Earlier this week on HoldtheFrontPage we carried news of the sudden death of long-standing regional lobby correspondent Ian Craig, who until earlier this year was political editor of the Manchester Evening News.

It is always sad when a journalist passes away, but the reaction to Ian's death and the breadth of the tributes that have been paid to him demonstrate that he was someone of very high renown within our profession.

The tributes were led by no less a figure than former premier Tony Blair, and others have appeared on Manchester Online, North West media website How Do, online memorials site Lasting Tribute, and the Newspaper Society website.

As I knew Ian personally from my lobby days, I have also posted my own memories of him on my personal blog.

Here's a selection of what has been said this week about this great regional press journalist.

Tony Blair, former Prime Minister

"It is truly shocking to hear this news. Ian interviewed me on a number of occasions and always struck me as a very talented journalist and a true gentleman. He has been a real credit to his profession, to British politics and to Manchester."

Mike Unger, former editor of the MEN

"Ian's death is a great, great loss. He was one of the great political journalists of his generation, with an outstanding record in both local and national politics. He was quiet, thoughtful, intelligent and hugely calm under pressure. It was a privilege to be friends with him for more than 35 years. And the genuine outpouring of grief and happy memories has been unbelievable. He will be truly missed."

David Hencke, chairman of the Press Gallery

"Ian will be sorely missed in Parliament - he was a great guy- and his sudden death comes as a big shock to everyone in the lobby. I always enjoyed chatting with him and he was incredibly friendly to everyone. He had a great nose for news and kept well abreast of everything happening in Westminster."

John Hipwood, political editor of the Express and Star and former Gallery chairman

"Ian was not only a consummate professional with the ability to write sharp and incisive intros, he was also a generous friend to many in the Press Gallery. At any gathering, his anecdotes and sense of fun made him great company, and not for nothing was he known as one of ‘The Three Muscadets’."

Matt Chorley, chairman of the Newspaper Conference

"Ian was a well-known and much respected member of the lobby, and his presence around the corridors of Parliament, with his archive of anecdotes on MPs past and present, will be sorely missed."

Ian Wylie, former MEN London editor

"Ian was a kind and considerate man who was hugely respected at Westminster. We worked alongside each other for the best part of a quarter of a century and I was also lucky enough to count him as a friend. In all that time we never once had a cross word. The number of shocked colleagues paying tribute to him is a mark of what a lovely man he was."

Will others follow where Trinity Mirror has led?

A certain amount flak will inevitably be flying in the direction of Trinity Mirror over its decision to take the Birmingham Post weekly. Indeed the NUJ's Chris Morley, who seems to reserve his most colourful invective for matters affecting Trinity Mirror Midlands, has already described it as "the corporate equivalent of self-harm."

But although the move will win the company few friends among journalists, some might applaud Trinity for having bitten the bullet over reducing the frequency of a loss-making title while most other publishers have merely talked about it.

Since the start of the downturn in the autumn of 2008, there have been numerous wild predictions about the industry's future, with claims that up to 650 local titles would close and many regional dailies would become weeklies.

So far, though, only two regional publishers have actually gone down that route - GMG Regional Media by taking the Reading Evening Post twice-weekly, and Trinity Mirror with yesterday's decision.

With a circulation down to 12,076 according to the most recent ABC figures, the Post was always a likely candidate for change of frequency.

Now the deed has finally been done, the big question in the industry will be whether this will prove to be a one-off - or alternatively, whether other publishers will now follow where Trinity and GMG have led.

Speculation mounts over Birmingham dailies

Speculation is mounting in the blogosphere over the future of the Trinity Mirror owned titles in Birmingham.

Nearly two months ago, the company launched a wide-ranging consultation over the future of the Birmingham Post and Mail.

Options under consideration included turning the Post into a weekly title and printing the Mail overnight. It is believed this would save around £1m a year on van runs.

Trinity Mirror is saying nothing officially as yet, but two Birmingham-based blogs are claiming that an announcement on the proposed moves is imminent.

Philip Parkin, operations director of the Birmingham Press Club, writes on his blog that "the coming week promises to be a significant one for The Birmingham Post."

"My spies tell me that this is the week that the announcement about the newspaper’s future is due to be made, with the switch to weekly happening sometime in late November," he says.

Another Birmingham blogger calling himself The Stirrer goes further, saying the announcement will be made today.

"Expect fireworks from newspaper publisher Trinity Mirror in the next 24 hours, with confirmation that the Birmingham Post is going weekly – possibly as early as November 5," he wrote yesterday, claiming staff have already been told that "major changes" on both titles are imminent.

3.30pm UPDATE: It's now official. The Birmingham Post is to go weekly, the Mail is to go to overnight printing, and both their editors have decided to leave. All the details over at HoldtheFrontPage.

Quiet birthday for Newcastle training course

In a similar sort of vein to the previous post, the journalism foundation course run in Newcastle by the Press Association recently turned 40, but there were no birthday celebrations for the renowned training centre.

Sadly for its many distinguished alumni, PA decided against holding a party due to the current economic climate.

The training scheme has been responsible for launching the careers of such regional press luminaries as the Herald's Donald Martin, Adrian Faber from the Express and Star and Brian Aitken of The Journal, in whose newsroom the students are now based.

Other notable graduates include BBC political commentator Andrew Marr, The Sun's newly-appointed political editor Tom Newton Dunn, Radio 4 presenter James Naughtie and Financial Times editor Lionel Barber.

The centre was originally the brainchild of John Gay Davis who became editorial director of Thomson Regional Newspapers, the then owners of Newcastle's Evening Chronicle and Journal, in 1969. He set up two operations, one in Cardiff and the surviving Newcastle operation.

Trinity Mirror later bought the course when they acquired the two Newcastle papers in 1995 before Press Association took over the reins in 2006.

Horrocks departs without fanfare

The announcement last month that Paul Horrocks was leaving after 12 years as editor of the Manchester Evening News was predictably one of our biggest stories of recent months, although interestingly, it got fewer page views on HTFP than our tale about the departure the MEN's last staff photographer, Mark Waugh, and only a few more than the one about assistant editor Robert Ridley quitting to become a driving instructor.

At the time of the announcement, no date was given for Mr Horrocks' actual departure, with the MEN Media press office merely saying it would be "some time in October" and promising to let us know more nearer the time.

As it happened, that time came and went without any further word on the matter. After receiving an out-of-office message from Paul this morning, we checked back with the press office who confirmed that in fact he left on Friday.

Doesn't it all seem a tad low-key for someone who has been such a high-profile figure in the industry over the past decade?

Credit where credit's due

The Newspaper Society's weekly newsletter arrived in our inbox this morning with an item about the local media fighting for open justice.

"Media commentator Roy Greenslade has highlighted recent instances in which local media journalists reporting on cases in criminal courts have used the updated guidelines on reporting restrictions," it read.

The piece was a reference to two stories in which London weeklies successfully argued against the imposition of Section 39 Orders under the Children and Young Persons Act which would have prevented newspapers from identifying the perpetrators of crime.

As Roy himself acknowledged in his blogpost, it was in fact HTFP which orginally "highlighted" both of these tales.

A job too far

Credit crunch, recession, economic downturn - sadly all expressions which feature heavily in today's news.

As a result, job hunting within the press and media industry has become increasingly difficult for those seeking career progression or a new, post-redundancy job.

It seems, however, that such pressures and constraints aren't weighing too heavily on the mind of one regional press job candidate.

Check out this "tweet" from Worcester News editor Kevin Ward, posted earlier today. It seems that some people out there are still benefiting from the luxury of choice!!

Experienced journalists need not apply

Are you an editor with 30 years' experience in the regional press? Know the industry from back to front? Perhaps ready for a new challenge after years at the coalface? Well, the Press Complaints Commission doesn't want to hear from you.

Earlier this week, Tim Toulmin announced he was stepping down as director of the PCC after six years.

We thought we'd drop the PCC a line to see if they wanted to advertise the forthcoming vacancy with us but were told: "As the position is not available to journalists or anyone working in the industry there would be little point in this so we will not be taking you up on this offer."

Apparently it's something to do with maintaining the PCC's independence. But am I the only one who finds this presumption that anyone who changes jobs automatically takes all their old prejudices with them rather patronising?

Only way is down for Beeb

Ben Bradshaw's speech to the Royal Television Society convention in Cambridge last night did not specifically mention the regional press, but there is no doubt that its content will have repercussions for the industry, in particular his comment that the BBC has "probably reached the limits of reasonable expansion."

The culture secretary pointed out that in the last 20 years, Bradshaw said, the BBC has grown from being a provider of two TV channels, four national radio stations and a local radio network to a media giant with a world-leading online presence and a commercial publishing arm, adding: "If it were to continue on anything like that trajectory, the rest of the industry would be right to be worried and the mixed economy would be seriously imbalanced."

This confirms the fairly widespread view that last year's battle over the corporation's plans to set up 68 local internet TV stations, and the ultimate defeat of those plans by a powerful regional press lobbying operation, probably represented the apex of the trajectory he describes.

Media Guardian has the full pdf of Mr Bradshaw's speech here.

Reverse publishing boon from hyperlocal project

A couple of months back we covered the launch of the new LocalPeople.co.uk sites in the South West by Associated Northcliffe Digital.

Now AND's director of strategy Roland Bryan has given an update on how the initiative is going in an interview with PaidContent which makes interesting reading.

Roland says that although LocalPeople wasn't designed solely as a community news platform, around 1,500 individual contributors have already posted something on the sites, with 12 user-generated stories finding their way into Northcliffe's print titles.

The initiative is due to be reviewed at the end of the year, but Roland says there’s no question that LocalPeople.co.uk will make money, “unless something very strange happens to our user numbers.”

Are the British obsessed with potholes?

Leicester Mercury editor Keith Perch penned an interesting counterblast a week or so back on the subject of potholes and why we in the UK are so "obsessed" with them.

Keith had been holidaying in Italy (lucky beggar) and noticed that while the state of the roads there was markely worse than in Britain, this at least had the effect of making people drive at slower and safer speeds.

"It made me wonder why we are so obsessed with potholes in this country. Every year, the Mercury runs stories about residents complaining about the state of the road where they live, councils run hotlines to allow potholes to be reported and, if memory serves me right, Leicestershire County Council proudly attempts to fix all potholes within 24 hours of them appearing," he wrote.

"But why? What is the real problem with potholes? Wouldn't the cash be better spent elsewhere?"

Keith may like to check out a new satirical blog which has come to our notice entitled Glum Councillors.

It features local newspaper pictures of councillors looking glum while inspecting - you've guessed it - potholes.

New term heralds spate of job moves

The first week back after the summer holidays has already seen some notable new editorial job moves, with ex-York Press editor Kevin Booth named as the new editor of the Burton Mail, and Northcliffe's Ian Carter jumping ship to become the new editorial director of the KM Group.

Now speculation is rife that another big appointment is on the cards, namely that former Scotsman editor Mike Gilson is to edit the Belfast Telegraph in succession to Martin Lindsay who retired last Friday.

The Gilson rumour has been flagged up today by the blogger Slugger O'Toole, who knows a thing or two about Northern Irish politics and media, and also on AllMediaScotland which is similarly well-connected in that part of the world.

There has been no announcement as yet from the Bel Tel, but sources there expect an appointment will be made in the near future.

Update: It's now official.

Meet The Squirrelizer

Continuing our silly season theme, it seems that the now-famous photo of an American couple on holiday in Canada has turned it into 'Squirrel Season'.

For those of you still unaware of what I'm talking about, check out one of the countless stories about how a playful intruder gate-crashed the duo's holiday snap.

The photo has inevitably gone viral and one intuitive techy type has launched 'The Squirrelizer'.

The concept is simple: enter the web address of any photo on the internet into The Squirrelizer and it will add our new friend - who's called Nuts apparently - to the image.

Hint: To get the web address of the image, right click your mouse over the photo and scroll down to properties. The address should be there.

Online social media guide Mashable.com is running its own Top 10 of squirrel crasher pics. And here's our entry to the collection - an adaptation of a big cat pic we featured in last week's Friday Funnies.

You can tell it's August....

After more than 20 years in journalism I'm not sure whether I still believe in the idea of a 'silly season' when it comes to news. The fact is, as has been highlighted both on HTFP and on this blog over recent months - remember the Whitstable custard shortage and the dead cat that united a Midlands town in grief - you can find daft news stories in the local press at any time of the year if you look hard enough.

Nevertheless, the current spate of stories about big cat sightings in the regional media is probably indicative to some extent of the time of year.

It all started in the Scottish town of Helensburgh when Ministry of Defence policeman Chris Swallow claimed to have captured footage of a large animal sniffing its way up and down a railway track.

But the story quickly moved south, with the Derby Telegraph carrying news of one of the fairly frequent big cat sightings in God's Own County.

Then it was the turn of the Croydon Guardian to get in on the act following a sighting of the puma-like creature in Crystal Palace, with the paper helpfully providing an 'artist's impression' as noted in our regular Friday Funnies page last week.

The elusive feline(s) have also been spotted in Carmarthenshire, Trowbridge, Wiltshire, and Welwyn Garden City.

There seems little doubt of the existence of big cats in the UK, with the likeliest explanation that they originated from creatures turned loose following the passage of a piece of legislation banning the keeping of wild animals as pets in the 1970s, but the fact that no-one has managed to capture irrefutable evidence of one on film - and that papers are reduced to providing 'artist's impressions' of them - probably demonstrates why they still make news.

As a friend of mine pointed out the other day, it's Nessie I feel sorry for.....

Council audits remain a closed book

Earlier this year HTFP carried a story about a news agency's laudable attempt to provide a comprehensive list of four-week council audits taking place this summer.

Under the Audit Commission Act, local authorities are required to open their books for public inspection for 20 working days each year.

Since councils are obliged to provide the actual receipts and supporting documents behind each accounts entry, they are a rich mine of stories for journalists, with councillors' expense claims being a favourite hunting ground for hacks who are into this sort of thing.

Unfortunately some councils do little to publicise the date of the audit, beyond the bare legal requirement to publish a public notice in a newspaper on a single day - prompting Orchard News agency boss Richard Orange to write to every council in the country asking for the information.

Richard's website shows he met with mixed success in this, with some councils resorting to the most mindless blocking tactics to prevent the information appearing.

For instance, Richard wrote to Middlesbrough council on 2 July asking them for the date. They replied on 30 July - the day before the audit was due to end. Milton Keynes council was even less helpful. Its reply did not arrive until three days after the books were closed.

Most of the four-week audits have now closed until next summer - but Richard's site reveals that there are still a few that are open for inspection.

So if you're a journalist in any of the following English local authority areas, it's not too late to get down to your council offices armed with a copy of the Act.

Open for another week

Bristol
Barnsley
South Tyneside
Sunderland
Barking & Dagenham
Brent
Kingston upon Thames
Redbridge
Southwark

Open for another fortnight

Reading
Hull
Bournemouth
Salford
Hounslow
Lambeth

Open for another three weeks

Bedfordshire
Cambridgeshire
Devon
Bromley
Haringey
Waltham Forest

A good response

Susan Greenwood Twitters that a recent advert for a trainee reporter on the Yorkshire Post garnered no fewer than 262 applications.

It's probably indicative of the state of the jobs market in the regional press over recent months, but for what it's worth I'm glad the YP got such a good response. The job ad appeared on HTFP for a fortnight last month and received more than 2,500 page views.

Being a journalist really can benefit your health

Knowledge gained is never a waste and what journalists write about for their papers may sometimes serve them well in their own lives.

So it proved for the health reporter of The Bolton News who has recently been laid up on her sofa with a bout of swine flu.

In a first person piece, Cherry Thomas explains that her partner came down with all the classic tell-tale signs of the flu bug.

Proudly wearing her health reporter's hat, Cherry knew exactly what to do having spent weeks writing about it for the News.

But no sooner had she handed over the necessary drugs to her partner, than she was struck down by dizziness, aches and temperature - and therefore was stuck with Jeremy Kyle and the four walls of her flat.

She wrote: "The strange thing is, I'd had lots of conversations with health professionals galore in recent weeks.

"I knew swine flu was no worse than seasonal flu and had been at pains to make that point in my stories.

"Yet somewhere, at the back of my mind, was a little bit of fear and apprehension at having swine flu. I wonder if I'd read too many scare-stories in the national press?"

Thankfully, a couple of weeks later everything was back to normal and cases of swine flu are also dropping, she reports.

That's enough Enders - Ed

I have blogged before about the American-born media analyst Claire Enders and her prediction that the next four years will see the loss of 650 of the UK's 1,300 local and regional newspapers.

My instinctive reaction to her pronouncements is that it must be very nice to be paid large amounts of money for spreading doom and gloom about other people's job prospects, but I'll try to let that rather uncharitable thought pass.

In her defence, Enders has been uncannily accurate in some of her previous predictions, such as forecasting the dotcom crash at the turn of the millennium, and that's probably why the business media seems to have accepted her analysis at face value.

But for all her undoubted intellect, she seems to deal more in sweeping generalisations and soundbites than in hard facts, her latest interview in yesterday's Guardian, in which she likened newspapers to fax machines and CD players, being no exception.

The facts are that 50 local newspapers have so far closed this year, almost all of them freesheets. If that rate continues for the next four years, we will see perhaps 200-300 close, although Enders clearly expects that rate of closure to accelerate.

As Dominic Ponsford points out on Press Gazette's blog, The Wire, it would be interesting to know whether she believes the closures will continue to come mainly from the free newspaper sector, or whether she thinks the 400 or so paid-for dailies and weeklies are under the same level of threat.

At times, Ms Enders' statements can gives the impression - intentionally or otherwise - that there is nothing the industry can do to avert the coming apocalypse, but even if that is the case, there is surely lots it can do to mitigate it.

What, for instance, does she think of the potential for saving titles through asset-swapping or further industry consolidation - or for that matter, through alternative ownership models as advocated by the NUJ and others?

In summary, I think it's time Ms Enders spelled out in much greater detail where she thinks the axe will fall, and by implication, which half of the industry she thinks still has a viable future in the digital world.

Failing that, she should consider taking the advice which Clement Attlee famously proffered to Harold Laski: "A period of silence on your part would be most welcome."

Credit where credit's due

Will Green, my successor-but-one as political editor of The Journal, scored a notable exclusive by persuading Minister for the North-East and Labour Chief Whip Nick Brown to go on the record with his thoughts about Newcastle United owner Mike Ashley.

The story, in which Brown effectively told Ashley to get out of Toon, was followed up over the weekend by several national newspapers.

But as Will reveals on his blog, while the Mirror's version of the story duly credited The Journal with the original scoop, the Daily Telegraph's version failed to include such a hat-tip.

Strange, that, given that the entire regional press has spent the summer busily hat-tipping the Telegraph over its MPs' expenses revelations.

Is Digital Britain turning into a dog's breakfast?

After some confusion as to whether Sion Simon or Stephen Timms would be taking over the Digital Britain brief from the now-departed Lord Carter, Downing Street has now ruled in favour of Mr Timms.

But anyone expecting any degree of clarity from the government over which Whitehall department will be ultimately responsible for implementing the plans will have been sorely disappointed.

The story so far is that Timms will remain in his current role as financial secretary to the Treasury, but with additional ministerial responsibilties at Lord Mandelson's Department for Business, Innovation and Skills.

In terms of his Digital Britain responsibilities, he will report to the Business Secretary, rather than the Culture, Media and Sport Secretary Ben Bradshaw, whose department has hitherto led on the Digital Britain report and who personally delivered it in an oral statement to the Commmons back in June.

Meanwhile Mr Simon, as creative industries minister, is to undertake some ill-defined supporting-role in relation to those aspects of Digital Britain which are still the responsibility of the DCMS.

The upshot of all this appears to be that Mr Bradshaw, a former Exeter Express and Echo reporter who has recently made some welcome comments about the threat to regional newspapers posed by council propaganda sheets, has been well and truly sidelined.

A cynical interpretation of this would suggest that Bradshaw, who is also a former BBC reporter, was deemed insufficiently impartial to rule on the vexed issue of whether the BBC licence fee should be top-sliced to fund new regional TV news consortia in which the local press is expected to play a part.

Either way, with so many departments and ministers now apparently involved, the words "too many cooks," "dog's breakfast" and "camel designed by committee" all spring to mind.

Paid-for content: Will the regionals follow suit?

Much excitement in Medialand today about Rupert Murdoch's announcement that, from next summer, he will charge people to read his newspapers' websites.

Press Gazette editor Dominic Ponsford reckons it could herald a new 'Murdoch Revolution' 23 years on from the one that crushed the print unions, completing the transformation of the 'Dirty Digger' from UK journalism's public enemy number one to its potential saviour.

We've not covered the story on HTFP thus far because, as things stand, it's a strictly national newspaper story, but it is certainly going to have big implications for the regional press further down the line.

If Murdoch, against the odds, can find a way of making money from online content - regarded as something of a Holy Grail in the industry - it is hard to believe the regionals won't eventually follow suit, but we're in unchartered waters here to some extent.

My own instinct tells me that while Murdoch may well find a way to successfully monetise 'exclusive' content such as The Sun's celebrity scoops and The Times' star columnists, it is going to be very hard to do likewise with hard news, in view of the sheer number of free-to-air news sources out there - and I'm not just talking about the BBC.

What do readers think? Let us know in the comments section below or by emailing editor.htfp@and.co.uk.

Where there's news, there's a chant

People losing their jobs and livelihoods is never a laughing matter and sadly the press and media industry has been too full of stories about redundancies recently.

Still, one can always rely on that most positive-thinking of demographics - the modern football fan - to shed a little comedy where others see only misery.

Last year Trinity Mirror announced it wanted to move printing of the Liverpool Daily Post and Echo out of the city to Oldham - a town not too far away from the home of Liverpool FC's biggest rivals, Manchester United.

So the inevitable has happened according to the Twitter feed of journalism lecturer and blogger Andy Dickinson:

Would Franzen have done better?

Former That's Life presenter Esther Rantzen today struck a blow for the journalistic profession by announcing she will stand for Parliament at the next election in the Luton seat being vacated by expenses row Labour MP Margaret Moran.

But if it's Rantzen for Luton South, it could have been Franzen for Norwich North, if Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg had had his way.

Peter Franzen was, until a few weeks ago, the hugely respected and long-serving editor of the Eastern Daily Press. But after announcing his retirement at the end of May, he was apparently then approached by Clegg to be the Liberal Democrats' candidate in the Norwich North by-election caused by the resignation of another MP hit by expenses revelations, Ian Gibson.

The story, which originally surfaced on Iain Dale's Diary and was subsequently carried on HoldtheFrontPage, has never been denied, and Peter's own carefully-worded non-denial - "it would be unfair to the now-adopted prospective parliamentary candidate for the Lib Dems, April Pond, to say any more" - seemed to amount to a confirmation.

In the event, of course, Ms Pond's selection proved disastrous for the Lib Dems. She came a poor third, prompting at least one political blogger to question Clegg's own future.

Would Peter have done better? Quite possibly. For all the low esteem in which they are allegedly held, journalists have a good record as "anti sleaze" candidates, as Martin Bell proved in 1997, and as the redoubtable Ms Rantzen may well prove in 2010.

Express & Star group gets 'fantastic manager'

When former North-East and Midlands MD Steve Brown left Trinity Mirror in a company restructure earlier this year, the response from his former employees in Newcastle and Birmingham was startling.

The NUJ chapel in Newcastle passed a vote of no confidence in the company's management over Steve's departure - despite the fact that he had previously overseen a round of job cuts at the North-East centre - while HoldtheFrontPage was deluged with comments in support of the former boss.

One Newcastle insider who called himself 'Angry Journo' wrote: "Steve Brown is without argument head and shoulders above all of them in terms of his passion, respect, strategic vision, performance delivery and intellect. Someone is going to get a fantastic manager soon. Good luck Steve."

He was right. Today it was announced that Steve is to take over as chief executive of the Claverley Group, parent company of the Wolverhampton Express & Star.

You are the strongest link.....goodbye!

Times are tough in the regional press and it's a constant gripe among the rank and file that wages are low.

So no-one can blame Salford Advertiser reporter Pamela Welsh for trying her hand at winning some extra PIN money by appearing on the BBC quiz show The Weakest Link.

Screened this week, it showed a confident Pamela burst her way through the early rounds and into the final three.

She even took time out to engage in some toe-to-toe verbal pugilism with host Anne Robinson about, among others things, crime reporting in Salford and her red dress.

Check out the show on the BBC iPlayer and skip to six minutes in to watch the fireworks fly.

But sadly for Pamela she was voted off by her two male co-contestants despite answering all her questions correctly in her final round and therefore being the strongest link.

As with all contestants, the Cambridge University graduate was able to comment on her eviction and Weakest Link experience.

She concluded: "I think what I'll take away from The Weakest Link is Anne's dress sense. I think it'll give me a real edge on the other journalists on my patch and make me harder and tougher and a bit like Anne herself."

Had Pamela won, she would have pocketed a cool £3,250. Shame!!

Are the Tories trying to spin their way into the regional press's good books?

Earlier this week the Tories made a bit of a splash in some quarters by announcing plans to allow newspaper groups to provide regional TV news using funding top-sliced from the BBC licence fee.

It was of course good to see David Cameron and co taking such an interest in the future of the industry, but I couldn't help thinking it was slightly opportunistic on their part, given that the creation of new regional news consortia was a key aspect of the Digital Britain report published by the government last month.

Shadow Culture secretary Jeremy Hunt berated Digital Britain for what he called its "lack of radicalism," but although it failed to spell out a role for local newspaper companies in TV news provision in words of one syllable, this was implicit in the proposal and was widely reported as such in the trade media.

As HTFP reported at the time, "newspaper groups, TV broadcasters and other news media organisations are expected to benefit" from the top-slicing proposal. Indeed the Press Assocation has already launched a local news pilot that seems to be putting down an early marker for a share of the funding.

Fair play to the Tories for getting a few headlines - that is their job after all - but essentially what they have done here is taken someone else's idea and given it a fresh angle.

And I thought it was just journalists who were supposed to do that sort of thing.....

Three out of four ain't bad

Congratulations to Oliver Luft who starts work as online news editor at Press Gazette on Monday, joining from Media Guardian.

Having previously worked for Journalism.co.uk, he now only needs to come and work for HoldtheFrontPage to complete a full-house of the four major UK journalism news sites.

Slow mews day in Lichfield?

We've had the one about the town that ran out of custard (see previous post) - now here's the one about the dead moggie that united a Midlands cathedral town in grief.

Well, it is July after all.....

The case of the disappearing story comments

Earlier this year, HoldtheFrontPage ran a piece about a weekly paper in Kent which had published a story about a mum-of-three complaining that the local shops had run out of custard.

It provoked a lively debate, both on HTFP and on the paper's companion website, thisiskent.co.uk, over the question of whether or not this constituted news.

One reader calling himself Nik from Newcastle commented: "How on earth did this terrible story make it to the morning news conference, let alone to print? As a fellow hack, I am shocked, appalled and rather ashamed at this dire example of journalism."

Another, Simon from London, added: "The journalist who wrote this and the news editor who allowed it should be sacked. You're taking the mick out of your readers."

At the time, Whitstable Times editor John Nurden, proudly defended his scoop, saying: "I sense fellow hacks are just jealous of our eggs-clusive."

"If it was our splash I would agree but I think it made a nice page four funny - and has attracted more comments than any other on our web site proving that custard shortages should be top of everyone's news menu."

Four months on, however, while the story is still visible on thisiskent.co.uk, the comments appear to have been taken down.

Maybe the editor decided it wasn't such a great "eggs-clusive" after all...

The joys of Twitter

As well as being one of the best observers of the national political scene either inside or outside the Lobby - check out his blog Outside the Bubble - David Higgerson is an enthusiastic Twitterer in his role as Trinity Mirror's head of multimedia.

Many journalists already follow his Twitter feed - but we thought this "tweet" during a recent train journey between Birmingham and Manchester deserved a slightly wider audience.

Coulsongate

Or should that be The Wages of Spin? Thanks to cartoonist Slob for this take on the potential political ramifications of the alleged News of the World phone hacking affair - it was originally posted on my political blog but I thought it merited another outing here.

Meanwhile regional editors have been having their say on the Guardian claims, with the Northern Echo's Peter Barron calling for a new police investigation.

Nothing 'Plain' about this entry

We at HoldtheFrontPage always try to be clear and concise in the way we write our stories. So it was with no little amusement that we stumbled upon this titbit from the Plain English Campaign - the lobby group launched in 1979 to combat incomprehensible jargon in government and public body documents.

It holds a small number of annual awards, including one for the best regional newspaper, won last year by the Salford Star.

In December, it will hand out its annual 'Golden Bull' gong for "the worst examples of written tripe".

And we hear the smart money is being waged on this 102-word piece of 'ploddledygook' from the Association of Chief Police officers, which discusses.....erm.....we've no idea actually. Over to you:

"The promise of reform which the Green Paper heralds holds much for the public and Service alike; local policing, customized to local need with authentic answerability, strengthened accountabilities at force level through reforms to Police Authorities and HMIC, performance management at the service of localities with targets and plans tailored to local needs, the end of centrally engineered one size fits all initiatives, an intelligent approach to cutting red tape through redesign of processes and cultures, a renewed emphasis on strategic development so as to better equip our Service to meet the amorphous challenges of managing cross force harms, risks and opportunities."

For the record, it was taken from ACPO's response to the government's green paper on policing and the way it will be conducted in the future.

Farewell to the Sporting Star

An interesting news item from the regional press has just landed on HoldtheFrontPage's radar.

After 90 years of publishing, the Midlands-based Sporting Star will cease publication at the start of the forthcoming football season.

The Sporting Star is owned by the Midland News Association whose titles include two of the UK's biggest-selling regional dailies - the Wolverhampton-based Express and Star and the Shropshire Star.

The timing is unfortunate for West Mids football lovers as Wolverhampton Wanderers have just been promoted to the big time of the Premier League while another Express and Star club Aston Villa have just enjoyed a very successful season.

For those unfamiliar with this publishing marvel, the Sporting Star and others of its ilk are written and published at breakneck speed, with the vast majority of its content coming from Saturday afternoon football matches.

Its demise signals the end of all 'pinks' in the Midlands after the Coventry Telegraph closed its edition last autumn, while the Birmingham Pink was closed three years ago by owners Trinity Mirror.

Express and Star MD Alan Harris was quoted in the Birmingham Post as saying: ".....unfortunately technology has outstripped its viability.

"First it was terrestrial TV, then it was Teletext, then Sky Sports and obviously now the internet. Also many of the major matches are not played on a Saturday.

"Reluctantly we have decided that the 2009-10 football season will not have the sporting pink."

Good business sense

Difficult times at Trinity Mirror at the moment, with the announcement of nine newspaper closures and job losses yesterday, and accusations from the National Union of Journalists concerning the future of two of its traditional morning papers, the Birmingham Post and Liverpool Daily Post.

The Guardian's Roy Greenslade has published a lengthy post analysing the TM Midlands proposals. Not all journalists will agree with it but it provides a useful counterbalance to the NUJ point of view.

Meanwhile, a correspondent from TM-owned Media Wales emails HTFP to let us know that the company has (in his words) "hit such hard times it is renting out the 5th and 6th floor of its new offices in Cardiff."

We say: good on them. If it helps avoid any further journalist job losses, then renting out unused office space surely makes good business sense. Come to that, there are probably other newspaper publishers who ought to think about doing the same.

Should local papers have led on Jackson's death?

The sight of regional papers splashing on national and international news always generates a fair amount of debate among journalists. For many, who see localness as our unique selling point, following the national news agenda is something that goes against the grain.

I recall an incident on one of my old papers a few years back when a regional political splash got knocked-off the front page by the fall of Saddam Hussein. It was a hugely controversial decision in the newsroom, but the toppling of that bronze statue in Baghdad in 2003 was one of the defining images of the decade, and it was always going to be a hard call to put something else on the front that day.

Over the past few days, the debate has been put into fresh perspective by the regionals' coverage of the death of Michael Jackson. As we reported on HoldtheFrontPage last Friday, many regional dailies made the decision to splash with the late-breaking story in the knowledge that early editions of the nationals alongside them on the news-stands had missed it.

But some HTFP readers were predictably less-than-impressed. One visitor to the site commented tartly: "Has is not occurred to anyone else that Michael Jackson is from Indiana - not Derby, Birmingham, Coventry, Leicester or Dorset."

The best piece I have so far read about this perennial dilemma for regional editors has come from the Leicester Mercury's Keith Perch. This is what he wrote on his blog:

At the Leicester Mercury, we see ourselves as a local newspaper. We report on Leicester and Leicestershire and rarely stray beyond these boundaries other than to put a local angle on to national or international events. But sometimes, things happen that are just so big that it is impossible to ignore them.

Princess Diana's death, the country going to war, 9/11, the London tube bombings, Lockerbie, the Hungerford and Dunblane shootings - these are all examples of things which are not local, but which are so enormous in terms of public conscientiousness and reaction, that I believe a newspaper not leading on them looks odd.

I don't think Michael Jackson's death comes quite into the same category despite the level of reaction, but, nevertheless, we took the decision late on Thursday evening to lead the paper on the night's events. Why was that? It was at least in part because it happened so late that I thought that it might miss the early editions of the national newspapers, but it was also because I felt that it was a big enough story to mean that it would be the only thing people were talking about the next day.

Was that the right decision? I don't know. Many other regional papers disagreed and didn't change up and it's too early to see what effect it had on our sales figures. However, I would say that when I saw the bills in the streets later in the day, I felt the decision was right.

I think Keith puts his finger on the issue here when he says that not leading on stories as big as the death of Jackson "looks odd." No doubt my old boss felt the same about the fall of Saddam.

Yes, localness is the USP of the regional press - but in this global village we now inhabit, there are times when international = local and local = parochial.

Is the NUJ guilty of scaremongering?

Sometimes the decision whether or not to publish a story on HoldtheFrontPage is not necessarily a straightforward one. One such instance was yesterday's press release from the National Union of Journalists claiming that publisher Trinity Mirror plans to axe eight weekly titles in the Midlands and turn the Birmingham Post into a weekly or bi-weekly publication.

If the story is true, a number of journalists' jobs will inevitably be lost, and there is an argument for saying that the NUJ should have kept quiet about this until the people affected had been informed in the usual way.

That said, once it had put out a public statement on the issue, not just to HTFP but to all our competitor media news sites, it became very hard for us to ignore the story.

It generated an interesting debate in the comments section. While most readers thought the NUJ was simply doing its job, a significant minority thought the union had acted irresponsibly, with one accusing it of having "put the fear of God up people."

The bear facts

Earlier this week, HTFP featured the preliminary results of a survey being carried out by a postgraduate student into the changing nature of press releases. Its key finding was that journalists regard most of the PR material they get sent as irrelevant, and that this has got worse since the invention of email.

A typical example arrived in my inbox yesterday morning from a group calling itself Release The Bears. It informed us that a 'brown bear' has been released into the wild at a secret woodland location to highlight the group's campaign to reintroduce the long-extinct British bear into the English countryside.

If this were true it might even have been newsworthy, though perhaps not for HTFP readers. Alas, the 'brown bear' in question turned out to be a man dressed in a bear suit, who will spend the next week living in a cave and eating only berries, roots, sprouts and fungi.

Given that real wild bears would be unlikely to discover the merits of vegetarianism if reintroduced into the UK, is this possibly the most pointless PR stunt of the year so far?

Snakes and ladders

An interesting little parable on the ups and downs of football and journalism comes from Lee Ryder, sports writer and author of blogonthetyne.co.uk.

A few years back Lee spotted an ad on HTFP for a sports reporter at the Scunthorpe Telegraph. It gave him his first break into journalism.

Back then 'Scunny' were in the basement division while Newcastle United were taking on Juventus in the Champions League.

Next season, the two clubs will be playing eachother in the Championship, and Lee will be going back to Glanford Park as the chief sports writer of Newcastle's Evening Chronicle.

Not-so-hot news from Cambridge

The weekly email bulletin from the Newspaper Society provides an invaluable guide to what our leading regional press industry body is up to, and as such is a regular source of stories for HTFP and other media publications.

But just occasionally, the voice of Britain's local media has been found to be a little off the pace.

This morning's bulletin contained a report on the opening of Iliffe News and Media's new(ish) £9.5m printing facility near Cambridge by Prince Edward.

Sorry to say, but this was carried on HoldtheFrontPage not one, not two, but a full three months ago!

Cards on the table time for would-be merger kings

So, what to make of the government's Digital Britain report published yesterday, and in particular its recommendations about whether the current newspaper merger regime should be relaxed?

Well, at first glance, the government appears to have managed the considerable feat of pleasing both Trinity Mirror chief executive Sly Bailey, who had argued for relaxation of the rules in order to allow greater industry consolidation, and NUJ general secretary Jeremy Dear, who had argued precisely the opposite.

Mr Dear sees the government's refusal to change the existing law as evidence that it is not going to allow what he calls "media plurality" to be undermined.

But Ms Bailey on the other hand says that legislation is not really the issue, and that the decision to allow communications watchdog Ofcom a bigger role in assessing merger proposals is a "step in the right direction."

So who's right in their interpretation? Well, as our main report on HTFP yesterday may have indicated, we're going with Bailey on this one.

Like many government reports - and as an ex-lobby hack I've read a fair few in my time - this is one where you really have to read the small print rather than simply reading the headline.

By ruling out a change in the law, the government is not saying no to further regional press consolidation, it is merely saying that the existing merger regime is sufficiently flexible to deal with any such proposals.

The clue was in the paragraph that read "there may be some lessons that could be learned from a detailed inquiry into a specific merger or transaction involving the local and regional press." This seemed to me to be tantamount to an invitation to publishers to bring forward a specific proposal which could then be used as a test-case.

There has been intense speculation, mainly in Sunday newspapers, that the big regional press publishers are set to engage in a round of asset-swapping to enable them to achieve greater geographical consolidation.

Without going into details, some of the scenarios that have been outlined seem literally incredible to me, but stranger things have happened.

I think what the government is effectively saying to the regional press in this report is: bring forward your merger proposals, and we'll show you that we're quite capable of dealing with them in a way that recognises present-day market realities.

In other words, the ball is now firmly in the industry's court.

Will 650 local newspapers really close by 2014?

Media analyst Claire Enders made a bit of splash at today's culture, media and sport committee hearing in the Commons by predicting that half the UK's 1,300 local papers would close over the next five years.

Ms Enders claimed that "many titles" were already losing money and were only being kept alive by the "good graces" of their publishers.

Although we at HTFP don't in any way underestimate the scale of the difficulties facing the regional press, I would certainly be interested to hear what evidence she has for this claim.

It hardly seems credible to me that regional publishers would keep loss-making titles going, and her comments don't really tally with recent half-yearly results showing most leading groups are still profitable, albeit at much lower margins than was once the case.

Queen snubs regional press

The twice-yearly honours lists published on the Queen's birthday and New Year's Eve can usually be relied upon to yield a good story for HTFP, with regional press figures regularly featuring among the recipients.

In the New Year's Honours List two years ago the Press Association's former northern editor Peter Beal was awarded an MBE while 12 months later Shrewsbury Chronicle editor John Butterworth was awarded the same honour.

Other notable recent winners include CN Group chief executive Robin Burgess who received an OBE and Press Association executive chairman Paul Potts who was awarded a CBE.

All four gentlemen received their honours for their services to the practice of journalism and in the case of John and Robin, their services to the wider community.

But this year's Queen's Birthday Honours list, announced today, is a rather different kettle of fish. The local and national press appears to have been largely ignored.

In the list we found the odd media type - former managing editor of Budapest Sun Robin Marshall and broadcaster and half-time microphone abuser Delia Smith - but no-one from local or regional newspapers.

Is it simply the case that local and regional press editors and MDs have too much on their plate at the moment to bother about getting themselves nominated for honours?

Or is it that, these days, the industry just doesn't have enough friends in high places?

Wrong Lewis

Northern Echo editor Peter Barron announces on his blog the arrival of new columnist Martin Lewis, who has recently made a name for himself dispensing money-saving tips on GMTV.

I have to confess I initially thought he meant Martyn Lewis, the ex-BBC newsreader who fought back the tears as Tony Blair delivered his famous "People's Princess" soundbite at the death of Diana, and sometime author of that ground-breaking journalistic tome, Cats in the News.

Ex Cabinet ministers tell all to MEN

One of the most enduring frustrations during my time as a regional lobby journalist was the way in which the New Labour spin machine systematically cut the regional press out of the loop when it came to the dissemination of government information, doutbless aware that we tended to be rather less biddable than our national counterparts.

So nothing gives me greater pleasure than to see a regional political reporter scooping the nationals to the big political stories.

David Ottewell of the Manchester Evening News is one of the best young political hacks in the business and he has now beaten the nats two days on the trot, securing the first exclusive interviews with both James Purnell and Hazel Blears since their Cabinet resignations.

The MEN filmed the Blears interview for its sister TV station, Channel M, and then syndicated it to the BBC and Sky News where the story has been running for most of the day. All power to your elbow, David.

Web-first or print-first?

Welcome to The Journalism Hub...and what better subject to kick-off with than the good old print vs online debate.

It is fair to say opinion within the industry on the question of whether newspapers should "give away" their content online for free rather than "force" people to buy the print edition to find out what's happening locally has moved pretty much full circle over the past decade.

I recall being at a gathering a few years back at which one regional newspaper editor declared that stories would be uploaded to the web "over [his] dead body." It got the biggest cheer of the day.

Nowadays, though, websites are seen effectively as editions of the paper, with most breaking news going straight online - although it remains the case that no-one has yet found a surefire way of making money from it.

The debate was highlighted this week in a blog post by Birmingham Mail editor Steve Dyson on his his decision to go print-first with an exclusive letter from footballer Gareth Barry explaining his reasons for leaving Aston Villa for Manchester City.

Steve revealed that his decision to delay uploading the letter to the paper's website for half a day had generated an extra 4,000 in sales and, confident that this would provoke the kind of debate we love to see on the site, we made it our top story on HoldtheFrontPage today.

For me, one of the great things about HTFP is the fact that it is, increasingly, the forum for discussion about issues facing the industry, and our readers did not disappoint with some fairly trenchant views expressed.

One poster calling themselves 'Edna' wrote: "You mean to say that giving something away for nothing stops people from paying for it...? Astonishing. If only journalists had been saying this for years, I'm sure editors and MDs would have listened."

Steve Dyson, though, had the last laugh on this occasion. As he revealed in a follow-up post on his blog today, he not only got a 4,000 + sales lift from the move, he also got an extra 30,000 web hits - the best of both worlds!

For me, the lesson from that is surely that print vs online is a false opposition. The truth is both have a vital part to play in the future of our industry.