Digital switch keeps regions in touch

News Corp reveals most of its community and regional titles that ceased printing during COVID-19 will not return to print.

News Corp’s Michael Miller has pledged the company’s commitment to being a voice for regional Australia as he announced a ­restructure that will see the bulk of its 100-plus community and ­regional newspapers turned into digital-only mastheads.

In a major strategic shift for News Corp, it announced on Thursday that most of its community and regional titles that ceased printing during COVID-19 would not return to print, a move that will result in job cuts but maintain a viable footprint in regional journalism.

The decision is also part of what has been a longer-term plan to restructure News Corp (publisher of The Australian) as a digital publisher, with 76 titles now becoming digital only, and another 36 no longer being published to be integrated into other titles by the end of June.

It will be the end of printed editions for some of Australia’s oldest newspapers such as the Parramatta Advertiser, The Queensland Times and Leader titles in Victoria that have been published for over 100 years.

Mr Miller said the publisher would seek to improve coverage and grow its subscriber base in the regions, with 375 journalists dedicated to the publications and their 640,000 digital subscribers.

“My message to them is that we’re not giving up on regional Australia. We’re moving to where regional Australia has moved,” Mr Miller said. “We are not moving out of communities and regions, there will be over 375 journalists dedicated to local community and regional news. Those mastheads are still going to be published digitally.”

Mr Miller — who once ran a regional publisher and spent large parts of his life in the country — said News Corp’s focus on digital would provide more detailed coverage than could be done previously. “We’ll be covering the local issues daily, even hourly, not just weekly.

“We’ll be continuing to publish them even better online constantly, where there’ll be more opportunities to write letters and comment more on local sports and community news and publish local photos.”

There will be large job cuts as a result of the changes, but Mr Miller would not say how many people could lose work, saying “today is about people, not numbers”.

He made it clear the choice for media was to adapt or die.

“Publishing in media is always needing to change with consumers. The companies that haven’t changed, jobs are no longer there.

“News Corp has always been a company that’s been willing to be forward thinking and make changes where necessary and to back ourselves.”

News Corp will now publish a total of 92 digital-only mastheads, with 16 purely digital titles launched in the last 18 months.

The Mercury in Hobart, as well as NT News, The Cairns Post, Townsville Bulletin, Gold Coast Bulletin, Toowoomba Chronicle and Geelong Advertiser will continue to publish in both print and digital formats.

Three Sydney community titles — Wentworth Courier, Mosman Daily and North Shore Times — which are distributed in the city’s most affluent suburbs, would resume print editions backed by real estate advertising.

While News Corp announced in April that 60 community and regional newspapers would halt print publication, Mr Miller said it became apparent in recent weeks the steep drop off in advertising of up to 40 per cent meant the titles would not return to print.

He said many titles “were challenged pre-COVID” but the pandemic hastened the process.

“The acceleration of advertising, particularly to digital platforms, had quickened,” he said.

“Additionally, in regional areas, there was continual pressure on small businesses now competing in a global market — and the majority of our revenues come from print advertising.

“Many media outlets around the world (are) impacted as a result of COVID.”

News Corp had recently undertaken an internal review of its community regional arm and had entered negotiations for a sale with Antony Catalano’s Australian Community Media.

After a deal couldn’t be reached, News decided to press ahead with a digital model.

“The options we had to consider were a divestment, which we tried to pursue, but (we had) increasing confidence that there was a business and an audience digitally for local news.

“This isn’t just a theory. It’s been practised now for a number of years and we have large numbers of community and regional subscribers among those 640,000 subscribers we have nationally.”

In addition, Mr Miller said major News Corp mastheads The Courier-Mail, The Daily Telegraph, The Herald Sun and The Advertiser would become more state focused, with more regional content and partnerships with local titles.

News Corp also recently announced the appointment of News’s chairman of editorial committee, Peter Blunden, as ­national executive editor, who has overseen the establishment of new specialist teams to deliver high-quality content integrated across all mastheads.