Let's not become a news desert.

Reform won Staffordshire County Council and we barely heard a peep about it.

I had a lie in last Saturday morning. I was scrolling on my phone in bed. It’s not something I usually do. I try and keep my phone in another room. The day never starts well if I’m on social media first thing.

Nevertheless, I was tired and fancied a lazy morning. Then, I saw social media posts about Reform UK taking control of Staffordshire County Council - my rule to not go on my phone in bed was confirmed. My day had not got off to a good start.

I’m not here to preach politics. What concerned me wasn’t just the party that had taken control, it was how this important political event had totally passed me by.

Shame, embarrassment, guilt and fear all curdled inside me.

How had I forgotten about all this? How had I missed it? Why hadn’t I made sure The Knot had covered it? What does this mean?

I scoured the internet for news and to my concern. Found very little.

Buried deep in SOT Live I found one article and I saw a couple on the BBC. Yet I found nothing that was Staffordshire specific. The SOT Live article seemed to be a copy and paste of the one in the BBC (I could barely read it because of the ads). A grand total of one original piece of journalism about this political event that to me seems very significant.

All I could find was generic reporting of Reform’s victory. No quotes. No insight. No opinion. Perhaps if I could stomach X, I might have found some more insight, but that platform is so full of hate and vitriol - I don’t go near it.

What’s more, in the lead up to these elections I’d barely even known they were happening, or why they matter. I live in Stone and got the ballot papers through the door reminding me of the election. They got stuck between two cookbooks on the counter and remain there, I think. We got one Labour flyer through.

The distinct lack of coverage, awareness and education around these local elections deeply concerns me and I felt frustrated with myself that I (personally and through The Knot) did nothing about it.

The result itself makes this lack of coverage, awareness and turnout even more stark. Reform immediately came out with bold claims. Labelling the council as the “wokest in the country”, making punchy remarks about DEI, remote working and renewable energy developments.

The good news I can find in this is that, clearly, people want change and their emotions and voices are being heard. But the complete lack of nuance and coverage to this political event leaves me and many others struggling to come to our own conclusions or analysis.

Even as someone who’s put time, money and energy into being an actively engaged citizen I still remain mostly clueless about what these elections mean for me as a resident and for Staffordshire as a whole, in relation to the rest of the country.

Knowledge is power. Information is a great leveller. Yet, when it comes to regional politics, local government or national politics impacting our area - we are devoid. We have very little political reporting in our region. We are becoming a news desert. I can think of ~5 journalists for ~500,000 people in the North Staffordshire region and I can think of zero who’s writing I could easily find and read.

Media institutions play a vital role in holding governments, businesses and leaders accountable. Scrutinising. Asking questions. Sharing information and opinion. In an age where we have information overload, we need trusted journalists to distill information and share it with us in a way that we understand.

Without this, we either become passive and disengaged or we allow social media users to become our source of news.

We’ve made great strides in the last few weeks to make The Knot sustainable and in the coming months we’ll grow our team of writers to cover music; more events and improve our ability to distribute news on social media.

Yet, we have to strive to cover regional politics too. If we don’t, who will? What’s the point in changing hearts and minds about this area if we don’t reach the political arena where change happens and decisions are made that shape our future.

On a practical level, I see a future where we share regular feature writing (which is what you have asked for) that covers politics, regeneration and “the big stuff” like budgets, transportation and council activity. We’ll need to find a sponsor to fund regular feature journalism like this and I’m hopeful we can. For around ~£4k a year, we can produce fortnightly journalism on these topics and I want to either find a sponsor or more members to cover this.

The Knot is a work in progress and we want to become the voice that fills this gap. Yet before we do, it’s imperative that everybody realises we are sleepwalking right now. Our crumbling news outlets and our retreating national coverage doesn’t just erode regional pride. The vacuum in quality information is genuinely dangerous and limits a well functioning democratic society.

Our lack of political coverage is a chasm we have to cross and one that I would like us to fill. Growing this news outlet will take time, but as well as covering the good news and what’s on to a larger audience, I’d love us to be reporting on the serious stuff too. Someone has to.

Cheers,

James