Newspapers go weekly in Johnston Press restructure

TWO daily Yorkshire newspapers are to switch to weekly editions as part of a restructuring programme by media company Johnston Press.

From next month, the Halifax Courier and the Scarborough Evening News will be published once a week under plans to create “platform neutral” newsrooms. Three other daily titles - the Northampton Chronicle and Echo, Peterborough Evening Telegraph and Northants Evening Telegraph - will also become weekly newspapers.

Johnston Press, which owns 170 paid-for newspapers including the Yorkshire Post, said platform neutral newsrooms will be created at all five centres with significant investment in both print and digital publishing to enable seven days per week publishing online combined with a bumper print edition of a newly formatted weekly newspaper.

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At the same time, the newspapers’ current websites will receive a light touch re-launch with more significant changes planned for July.

Johnston Press chief executive, Ashley Highfield, said: “The media and retail landscape is changing at an incredible pace and we have to ensure that our products change with it. These five titles, which have always been at the heart of the communities they serve, must meet those needs in the most relevant way as technologies continue to evolve.”