Former editor to sub-editors - you are no longer required on board

Former editor to sub-editors - you are no longer required on board.

Over the years, I have taken a lot of flak for suggesting that the days of newspaper sub-editors are numbered (here in 2008, and here and here in 2009).

Now Neil Fowler, who edited four regional titles, has discovered just how unpopular it is to write off subs. In an article for the magazine InPublishing, he argues that "the luxury" of having staff in order "to rewrite and fact-check every reporter's story has gone."

Instead, he believe that reporters and writers need to be imbued with both a culture and practice of getting their articles "right first time, every time."

To that end, he calls for a system in which student journalists are required to be tested on basic journalistic (and literature) skills - such as spelling, grammar, writing to length, headline-writing and "getting the best out of dull stories - before they are given newsroom jobs.

http://www.theguardian.com/media/greenslade/2014/mar/28/local-newspapers-newspapers