Letter: 'Independent' and the deal with MGN
Your support helps us to tell the story
From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it's investigating the financials of Elon Musk's pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, 'The A Word', which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.
At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.
The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.
Your support makes all the difference.Sir: The Independent is a paper of record: may I put the record straight in respect of one passage in Saturday's article 'Enduring values and new strength', about recent events at Newspaper Publishing? You say: 'Faced with an accelerating decline in the circulation of both newspapers and mounting losses, we were confronted with a choice - taking an axe to the editorial budget and hoping for the best or taking decisive action to break out of the vicious circle.' Correctly rejecting the first option, you go on to imply that an association with a British newspaper group was the only alternative.
But such an association need not have involved a major equity stake and board memberships. There was another option, as Patrick Morrissey's (the chief executive) business plan, presented to the board on 21 December, demonstrated. This was to gain the benefits of joint production and distribution without surrendering an equity stake to the provider of the shared facilities. This course would have given us greater managerial independence, and hence greater editorial independence, afforded a keener price for the provision of facilities which would have been at arm's length, and avoided swingeing cuts in editorial budgets - which were never a feature of the business plan.
Regrettably, you and our Spanish and Italian shareholders had already committed yourselves without waiting to consider the other alternatives that offered. The viability of the Morrissey route was confirmed by Dr O'Reilly's willingness to invest after he had reviewed the plan in detail.
However, that is all in the past. I sincerely hope that the new arrangements, which, admittedly, give the Independent papers strong financial backing, will afford a regime in which they once again flourish.
Yours sincerely,
IAN HAY DAVISON
Chairman
Newspaper Publishing Plc
London, EC1
19 March
Join our commenting forum
Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies
Comments