Keith Perch's resignation as Leicester Mercury editor is bad news for the city

Yesterday Hold the Front Page broke the news that Keith Perch, the editor of the Leicester Mercury, was quitting the paper with immediate effect. I had, of course, already heard this, but the nature of my source meant that I could not blog or tweet it as a scoop myself.

Keith's resignation is bad news for the Mercury. At various points in the recent past it has either been absurdly right wing or far too friendly with the city council. But under his editorship it has consistently broken important stories and held the city's politicians to account, thanks largely to the paper's excellent political reporter David MacLean.

This latter role is particularly important in a city with a Labour elected mayor and where all but two councillors are Labour too.

But you have to wonder whether Northcliffe Media, the owners of the Mercury, are losing their appetite for this sort of journalism. Already the paper's website looks like something that belongs to a free glossy magazine rather than the daily newspaper of a considerable city.