THIS week marks the annual Local Newspaper Week – celebrating all that is good about local newspapers and the community we live and work in.

The Warrington Guardian has been at the heart of the community for more than 150 years.

Now changes in the media and the current economic climate means papers like ours, and hundreds of others up and down the country, face uncertain futures.

Falling profits, paginations and advertising means every paper and newspaper group is fighting for survival.

Yet news has never been more popular.

Dozens of 24-hour news channels are available on our televisions, news sites flood the internet and magazines all include news snippets. Even mobile phones can be used to keep up-to-date with all the headlines.

In an increasingly fast-paced world, news needs to be immediate and instant.

So why are local papers struggling?

Less movement in the property and job markets means less advertising in the paper, therefore fewer pages and smaller papers.

And our expanding website means there is less pull for people wanting to buy the paper.

But in Local Newspaper Week there is no better time to reflect on what a local newspaper means to a town like ours, and the benefits it brings.

Former chief executive of Warrington Borough Council Steven Broomhead, pictured, now chief executive of the Northwest Regional Development Agency, always referred to the Warrington Guardian as a ‘critical friend’.

And that is true.

Where else would you find out about the planning application at the bottom of your street? Where else that your school was closing?

Where else that money needed to be raised to help a favourite charity? And all written by impartial journalists, not paid-up council or police spin-doctors.

Here at the Warrington Guardian we bring you the best news every week, and every day on our website.

And we celebrate all that is good in our community, our popular Pride of Warrington campaign bringing the good news as well as the bad.

There may be challenging times ahead and the Warrington Guardian will need to change.

But as long as people keep wanting the news, we will keep providing it.