Scrapping statutory public notices could pay for innovation in community engagement

The Chancellor called time on statutory local newspaper notices for the licensed trade last week, telling The Mail on Sunday that they present an expensive and bureaucratic barrier for bars and restaurants.

Rachel Reeves’ comments will also resonate with those following the protracted debate about statutory local authority notices for other matters, including planning applications.

Local authorities are obliged by law to publish information about issues affecting local residents. No single legislation requires this; the rules evolved before the internet to keep local communities informed through printed newspaper notices.

But with falling local newspaper circulations and title closures, it does beg the question: if few people see local authority planning notices in a local newspaper, what is their purpose, and should taxpayers fund them?

The Digital, Culture, Media and Sport Committee strongly recommended the previous government review the rules and practices for placing statutory notices in local newspapers in 2023, but to date there has been no significant change.

The Local Government Association estimates that local authorities spent over £28m on statutory notices that year, condemning a ‘taxpayer subsidy of the commercial newspaper industry’ despite changing public news habits.

Currently passing through parliament, the Planning and Infrastructure Bill provided an opportunity for review and has suggested some small changes that will have an indirect impact.

The bill aims to streamline the Development Consent Order process for Nationally Significant Infrastructure Projects and introduces changes to pre-application consultation requirements. This is likely to reduce the number of statutory newspaper notices for DCOs, with developers urged to explore other means of engagement.

Mainstream ‘legacy’ publishers are understandably resistant to change, arguing that statutory notices are a vital part of the democratic process. They also want to protect a major source of advertising revenue.

Reach PLC, publisher of the Manchester Evening News and Liverpool Echo, doesn’t disclose specific revenue from statutory notices. By way of example, our research shows Manchester City Council paid Reach Publishing Services PLC £228,761.93 for advertising in 2024/25. This was part of an overall £780,724.01 advertising spend, including £465,000 on Facebook.

Legacy publishers are innovating to stay in the game. The News Media Association – ‘voice of the UK national, regional and local newspapers’ – collaborated with the Google News Initiative to launch the Public Notice Portal, a digital platform enabling visitors to search by postcode for statutory notices which have appeared in a newspaper.

Another quirk of the current arrangements is that the growing number of independent local news sites with a growing audience cannot benefit from revenues from statutory notices as they do not qualify as a local ‘newspaper’.

Joshi Hermann, founder of Mill Media, publisher of The Mill in Greater Manchester, says the current system is bad for local authorities and for democracy.

Maintaining that public notices have a vital role, he adds: “It’s time for a review. The current print circulation of the Manchester Evening News is less than 10,000. I’d guess that only 1 in 10 of those readers see those notices in a city of three million people.

“If we can show that we can get public notices in front of more people in Manchester than the Manchester Evening News, then we should get the money.”

David Higgerson, Chief Content Officer at Reach PLC, is concerned about the Chancellor's proposed changes to public notices for licensing issues, which he says would effectively remove them completely from 'independent' spaces.

But he agrees that it's time for a review of the public notice system more generally.

"I think there's a really sensible debate to be had about the role public notices play in a world where most people - but not all - get their information online," he says.

"The public notice system only works if everyone plays their part, including the public sector recognising the right of the public to be kept informed, and be allowed to have a say on things which matter to them.

We should be encouraging a system in which public notices are posted where the greatest number of local people can see them, which is why local media came together to launch the Public Notices Portal - creating one place where most notices are now posted.

"For me, the debate should be around how we get notices in front of as many people as possible - across all platforms, recognising that print still plays a role."

Something we should all agree on is the ongoing importance of communication and engagement in the planning process. Statutory notices have been an important part of that for generations.

But habits and technology change and the significant investment in statutory notices could surely now be better spent in partnership with developers on more effective means of community engagement.