The Newspaper Society is concerned that councils are damaging their local newspaper industries with freely available council newspapers.

In a letter addressed to Rosie Winterton, the Minister of State at Communities and Local Government, the Newspaper Society has laid out its concerns about the competition that free newspapers create for local paid newspapers. With council newspapers often covering many of the major events that local newspapers would normally report on, many commuters might be skipping the paid local papers due to feeling that the free ones are informative enough.

“Unfortunately, an increasing number of local councils across the UK are actively competing with local newspapers for readers and advertising revenues,” wrote Lynne Anderson, the Newspaper Society’s communications director.

Anderson also went on to point out that local newspapers are “vital to the functioning of any healthy local democracy, scrutinising the effective operation of local authorities, examining how council taxpayers’ money is spent, and holding elected representatives to account.”

While arguments about the government not providing competition are unlikely to hold much water with anyone outside of the Newspaper Society, the role of local newspapers in keeping local governments in check is an important one. Larger regional or national newspapers are unlikely to investigate the abuses of local governments, but local newspapers will often make this their bread and butter.

Free council newspapers certainly have their benefits, such as keeping the local population aware of special events and government projects, but they are unlikely to be critical of the local administration. It is unlikely that councils will stop publishing free newspapers if they are an effective way of getting out a message, but the role of council newspapers could certainly be better defined in order to avoid direct competition with local for-profit publications.