The decline of local print-based media has been ongoing for quite a few years now. With questions of trust and bias in national media, the existential threat of the loss of local print media has become more noticeable. In today’s society, people are increasingly looking to gain information from news media outlets online and in other forms than print. This has led to a devastating impact on local news publications and the communities they serve.
Equally, the declining interest in print-based media and subsequent loss of demand for printing press halls means that local jobs and the environment are all negatively impacted. This has been seen recently in Portsmouth with the demolition of The News Centre.
Relocated power and community detachment
The now demolished News Centre in Hilsea, Portsmouth had been the home of Portsmouth News since 1969 after it moved from Stanhope Road. Portsmouth News was housed in The News Centre until 2013, when the newspaper team relocated to offices in Lakeside – and it has now moved again to Technopole, where office space is owned by the current publishers of The News; National World.
The printing press hall at The News Centre also served various newspapers for the local area as well as nationally for the last 50 years, until its closure in 2022. This closure came after the owners of the print hall at the time, DMG Media, had been in ownership for less than two years after taking over control in 2020. The site was sold to First Bus Company in March 2023.
First Bus faced harsh criticism for revealing plans for the site, submitted to Portsmouth City Council, for the building of a new depot for 90 electric buses. There were many objections to the plans at the time, once it became known about the proposed demolition, including the C20 Society who campaigned for an Article 4 Direction, which was refuted by the council, despite students at Portsmouth University architecture school having been involved in creating concept designs for the site.
The iconic 60s architecture was one of the first buildings you saw coming into Portsmouth, with many Portsmouth residents recognising and having a connection to the building.
Demolished rather than repurposed
With First Bus and Portsmouth City Council working together and promoting plans for a greener and more sustainable Portsmouth, it is ironic that they have now demolished a building that could have been repurposed rather than erased completely, thus erasing the link that Portsmouth has had to local and national print journalism.
The News, originally called The Evening News, had been printed in The News Centre at Hilsea from 1969 until its closure in 2022, where it is now printed 101 miles away to the east of London in Thurrock, Essex. With another clear negative impact on the environment and employment, where ‘local’ news is now printed and then shipped to distribution over 100 miles away, it signals another slow demise for locally based print journalism.
‘Local media’ and conglomerate ownership
In 2023, Media Reform reported that just six ‘parent’ companies owned 71% of the 1,189 local newspapers, both print and online, in the UK. The decline in locally owned public interest journalism is evidence of a national problem.
Local papers are fighting for survival. With an increasing number of ‘local’ newspapers now having to create content that creates clicks and promoting paywall-style premium subscriptions due to the direction of their parent companies, it is leading to potential situations where stories from the local area that should be told won’t be and power isn’t held to account for local communities.
Portsmouth News is still delivering on important reporting for Portsmouth and the local area, and has been praised by people whose stories they’ve told for their coverage of events.
Even so, one of the questions is; how long will that be able to continue? What happens when these large corporations who dominate ownership, no longer find any purpose or value in smaller local news publications?
What happens to the buildings and printing press halls the newspapers used to inhabit?
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