View all newsletters
Sign up for our free email newsletters

Fighting for quality news media in the digital age.

John Prescott’s Sunday Mirror column axed after five years due to ‘cutbacks’ at the paper

By Charlotte Tobitt

Former Deputy Prime Minister John Prescott’s Sunday Mirror column has been axed after five years, reportedly due to cutbacks at the paper.

Prescott included a line in yesterday’s column, in which he reacted to Chancellor Philip Hammond’s Spring Statement and advocated raising taxes, to warn readers he would imminently be leaving the newspaper.

He wrote: “I’m afraid I’ll soon be saying goodbye. Due to cutbacks, the Sunday Mirror has decided to end this column.”

The line was not included in the online version of the column.

Prescott joined the Sunday Mirror as a columnist in 2013, when he said he was able to speak his mind “like never before” after leaving the Government, where he had served under Labour leader Tony Blair.

He also said he hoped to show more of his “humorous, human self, the bloke that can take the mickey out of himself” in the column.

In 2015, after Trinity Mirror formally apologised for phone hacking carried out in the past, Prescott wrote that it “seems a lot of tabloid papers in the past were contaminated with this appalling practice.

Content from our partners
How PA Media is helping newspapers make the digital transition
Publishing on the open web is broken, how generative AI could help fix it
Impress: Regulation, arbitration and complaints resolution

“But that’s no excuse. We expect more from the Mirror.” He also called on the Sunday Mirror to support the Royal Charter on press regulation.

A Trinity Mirror spokesperson confirmed the Prescott column is going but declined to comment on cutbacks at the paper.

Earlier this month, Trinity Mirror, which announced it is changing its name to Reach following its takeover of Express Newspapers, reported a £90m (13 per cent) fall in group revenue to £632m last year.

The company said it is targeting a further £15m in cost savings in 2018 after delivering £20m of “structural cost savings” in 2017.

Picture: Reuters/Action Images/Ed Sykes

Topics in this article : , ,

Email pged@pressgazette.co.uk to point out mistakes, provide story tips or send in a letter for publication on our "Letters Page" blog

Select and enter your email address Weekly insight into the big strategic issues affecting the future of the news industry. Essential reading for media leaders every Thursday. Your morning brew of news about the world of news from Press Gazette and elsewhere in the media. Sent at around 10am UK time. Our weekly does of strategic insight about the future of news media aimed at US readers. A fortnightly update from the front-line of news and advertising. Aimed at marketers and those involved in the advertising industry.
  • Business owner/co-owner
  • CEO
  • COO
  • CFO
  • CTO
  • Chairperson
  • Non-Exec Director
  • Other C-Suite
  • Managing Director
  • President/Partner
  • Senior Executive/SVP or Corporate VP or equivalent
  • Director or equivalent
  • Group or Senior Manager
  • Head of Department/Function
  • Manager
  • Non-manager
  • Retired
  • Other
Visit our privacy Policy for more information about our services, how New Statesman Media Group may use, process and share your personal data, including information on your rights in respect of your personal data and how you can unsubscribe from future marketing communications.
Thank you

Thanks for subscribing.

Websites in our network