The UK’s news environment is in danger of fracturing irreparably along social, regional and economic lines within the next five to ten years, with grim implications for our society and democracy, a House of Lords report published today warns.
“The outlook for some areas is concerning,” says The Future of News, the first report of the Lords’ Communications and Digital Committee’s inquiry into “The Future of News: Impartiality, Trust and Technology”.
“Local news deserts have been growing, meaning many local communities have little local reporting,” it says. “Overall trust is low, news avoidance is on the rise and a growing number of people are embracing dubious online sources.”
Drawing together the evidence from its inquiry, the committee concludes that: “The period of having informed citizens with a shared understanding of facts is not inevitable and may not endure.”
While news enthusiasts will remain well served, a growing proportion of society will have limited engagement with professionally produced news, and the gap is widening warns the report. These trends are being exacerbated by the impact of generative AI tools, which can create engaging news summaries and provide tech firms with unprecedented influence over the type of news we see.
The Lords’ recommendations include supporting local media with tax breaks for hiring local reporters, journalist training schemes and an expanded Local Democracy Reporting Service (LDRS).
But it warns against well-intentioned government interventions that would risk undermining media independence.
The report comes, coincidentally, within 24 hours of an analysis by North East Bylines of the crisis facing local democracy which also highlighted the decline of local newspapers, and four days after a seminar on the same subject at the Centre for Urban and Regional Development Studies (CURDS) at Newcastle University.
News deserts
Baroness Stowell, chair of the committee, said members were especially concerned by news deserts where local newspapers had folded and people were left without any real scrutiny of local politicians and public bodies. She said:
““The future of news matters. Accurate and well-informed news creates the shared understanding of facts which is so important to our democratic system…Some traditional media outlets must work harder to keep up with the priorities and reflect the perspectives of large sections of their audience. People are voting with their feet and going elsewhere.
“Because of their ‘anchor’ role in the media, public service broadcasters, and the BBC in particular, need to reflect on this and focus on meeting audiences’ needs and expectations. They should not be tempted to explain away the challenges by focusing only on external forces. Their own choices and approaches to reporting matter. And we all lose out when we don’t understand how the world appears to each other.”
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