The DCMS Committee report on the Sustainability of Local Journalism outlines how many local publishers, with smaller audiences and reach, have struggled to adapt to the shift away from print towards an online world which favours larger players. Between 2009 and 2019, more than 300 local newspaper titles closed, with surviving news providers often operating with diminished resources and fewer journalists.

The Committee highlights the harmful impact on communities of the resulting decline in access to local news, including a decrease in participation in civic life, less scrutiny of local government decisions and increasing levels of polarisation and misinformation.

To support the sector to adapt to the new market, the report recommends that the Government establishes an innovation fund for news as proposed in the Cairncross Review. It should also explore ways to make it easier for local news publishers to achieve charitable status and encourage more philanthropic funding of local journalism.

More must also be done to ensure that support reaches smaller publishers of local news, and long-awaited digital markets legislation must enable news sites to negotiate a fair commercial relationship with online companies that host their stories, such as Google and Meta.

The Committee also calls for the BBC to reconsider its proposals for its local radio stations to share more content across regions as part of its digital first strategy. The corporation wrote to MPs since the report’s agreement saying that it had adapted various proposals, although the main changes of concern to the Committee will still go ahead.

However, the Committee says, despite the collapse in revenues and challenges for surviving titles, there are encouraging examples of innovation by local news publishers. In the Committee’s view, the sector can be revived and have a sustainable future with the right support. To read the Committee’s press release in full and for links to the full report, click here.