PINF welcomes local news partnership presented by BBC Green Paper

The Public Interest News Foundation (PINF) has welcomeed the requirement in the Government’s Green Paper, published on 16 December, for the BBC to complement high-quality local news providers, including through partnerships, so that the public can benefit from a thriving and diverse local news market. 

PINF says they are pleased to see a strong commitment to the Local Democracy Reporting Service (LDRS), which has been reporting on important stories since 2017, and they urged the Government and the BBC to enhance the LDRS and introduce a new Local News Commissioning Fund, to support local news providers to report on communities across the UK in partnership with the BBC. 

The BBC’s Royal Charter is due for renewal at a moment when the BBC, along with the whole news industry, is facing a combination of political, economic, social and technological challenges.   

This creates a pivotal moment for the BBC to reconsider its relationship with local journalism, to collaborate with truly local news providers who are led by, for and with the communities they serve, and put the information needs of local communities before all other interests.  

Building new relationships with professional local news outlets will allow the BBC to connect with a far greater range of audiences and engender trust in a way that is becoming impossible for national news brands.   

Reframing the BBC’s role as partner and facilitator of the local news ecosystem will rebuild public trust, revitalise local democracy and ensure a sustainable future for public interest journalism in the UK.   

PINF will be developing the ideas set out in the Green Paper in more detail in the coming months.  

Jonathan Heawood, Executive Director of PINF said: “Charter renewal presents a unique opportunity to shore up access to trustworthy local information and rebuild trust with UK communities. The BBC can achieve this by becoming a genuine partner and enabler of a diverse local news ecosystem by investing in the Local Democracy Reporting Service and launching a new Local News Commissioning Fund to ensure that diverse, community-centred journalism speaks to, for and with everyone in the UK.”