Amplify: The Local Media Action Plan
The Local Media Action Plan sets out government plans to support the sustainability of local journalism in the UK.
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Local media plays a vital role in the fabric of our society, keeping citizens informed about decisions and events which directly affect them, scrutinising the activities of local public services and other institutions, and helping to reflect the views and perspectives of citizens and communities.
The Local Media Action Plan sets out a vision for financial sustainability of local journalism, achieved through continued digital innovation, proportionate regulation and renewed audience engagement, supported by findings from research into local media coverage of the Southport riots and into the relationship between local news presence and delivery of local public services, both being published alongside the action plan.
To achieve this, we intend to:
- support local media in operating in a fast-paced digital environment. Targeted funding will particularly focus on local news publishers, where we know the challenges have been most acute. In the short-medium term, we will help the industry innovate and transition through digitalisation and build sustainable online-focused business models;
- support local media over the longer term by helping the industry adapt to changing online audience habits and reach younger audiences, and foster a collaborative and complementary relationship with those that have most influence over citizens’ news diets - particularly big tech and the BBC; and
- tackle the practical obstacles to public interest newsgathering and incentivise production of more high quality and relevant local news content.
This action plan is also a statement of intent, underpinning the current government’s renewed commitment to ensuring a healthy and plural local media ecosystem for the benefit of our communities and citizens.