For several weeks, Gavin Schmidt couldn’t sleep at night. He started taking his blood pressure monitor to work, checking it twice a day. He wishes now he had shared his burden earlier, but eventually he told the 30 staff of the Barrier Daily Truth in Broken Hill why he was so worried.
Advertising had collapsed and the paper was losing thousands of dollars a day. They faced a choice: the newspaper that had published continuously for 112 years would either have to shut for the duration of the coronavirus outbreak, or stagger on for a few more weeks, run out of money and close forever.
Reporters, delivery drivers, cleaners and advertising staff gathered at the paper shed at the back. They raised their hands, voting unanimously to suspend publication so that the paper could reopen when the crisis was over.
The edition of 28 March was meant to be the last for months. “We are devastated,” Schmidt told readers. “We just couldn’t run our beloved paper into the ground without giving it a chance of surviving on the other side.”
That was meant to be end of the story for a while, but it has a twist. An extraordinary rescue effort was launched that meant, all going well, the paper serving this outback New South Wales town of 17,000 people can resume publishing one day a week.
The Barrier Daily Truth is Schmidt’s life. He started as a printer in 1976, aged 16. He became its photographer in 1988, then worked his way up to circulation manager, and last November, acting general manager. Last week, “in the middle of this crap fight”, his appointment was confirmed.
There’s not a whiff of the corporate about Schmidt – he sits in his office wearing an old Tottenham football T-shirt. His staff have applied for jobkeeper, the federal government scheme for businesses to hold on to workers during the pandemic, paying them $1,500 a fortnight. Schmidt, 60, has applied for jobkeeper, too. “It’s all in or all out,” he said. “We all work together and socialise together. We’re like a family here.”
Schmidt is especially worried about the paper’s older readers (around 70% of them are pensioners) who often aren’t digitally savvy.
“The old people love their classifieds, their death and funeral notices,” he said. “Their TV guide, the local news. It would be devastating if we haven’t got a paper. The sporting clubs – there’d be no football previews and after-the-game summaries.”
The Barrier Daily Truth’s financial crisis is echoed across the country, with dozens of regional papers closing or winding back operations.
After weeks of lobbying, the federal government on Wednesday announced $50m to help regional journalism survive.
The Barrier Daily Truth has an unusual history. Broken Hill, in the far west of NSW, was a mining town, the birthplace of BHP. The harsh mining conditions of early last century forged a powerful union movement, and the unions have owned the paper since 1899. The Barrier Industrial Council still own it, and Schmidt remembers the days when being a union member meant it was all but compulsory to subscribe. Its days as a union mouthpiece are gone, he says.
“We’re just a local paper now. We try and run it as non-biased, evenhanded reporting … it’s pretty much a not-for-profit.”
It is a mining executive who has come to the rescue of this union-owned newspaper. Robert Williamson, 59, is the chief operating officer of Lodestone Mines and Toll Resources. He was born in Broken Hill, starting his working life as an electrical apprentice in the mines. He no longer lives locally, but when he heard the paper was closed, he volunteered to put together a business plan to save it, at least once a week for now.
He rang around from his base in Adelaide. The plan was simple enough: if the staff volunteered for two days a week – while they received jobkeeper – about $6,000 in advertising would be enough to cover costs to print once a week for 12 weeks. If more advertising comes in, the staff will have their jobs back.
Williamson estimates he’s spending six hours a day making phone calls, working with Schmidt to persuade, hassle, convince companies to advertise in a little paper in Broken Hill. One thing that became obvious was that national businesses such as Coles and Woolworths don’t advertise locally, even though they have customers in regional towns. He’s on to them. Then there’s McDonald’s – “I’ve got McDonald’s, they’ll start advertising this week.”
A breakthrough was when two local mining operations – Perilya and CBH Resources – agreed to each spend $5,000, even though they had nothing really to advertise.
“I’m in talks with BHP and Rio Tinto,” said Williamson, “and I expect they will respect that the town is part of their beginning.”
Williamson and Schmidt have called local MPs seeking support. One of Schmidt’s frustrations was that federal government advertising explaining the coronavirus restrictions and advising people how to apply for assistance hadn’t been placed in his paper. That’s changed.
On Good Friday, 10 April, the newspaper resumed publishing, one day a week for now. The page one photograph was of masked health workers at the Broken Hill Health Service thanking the community for donations of flowers, chocolates and words of kindness for those on the pandemic’s frontline.
Flipping through the paper, there are two full-page federal government ads, explaining the restrictions and the jobkeeper scheme. National party federal member Mark Coulton – who Schmidt credits with pushing for the government advertising – has a half-page ad “backing Broken Hill and the essential role the BDT plays” during the pandemic.
Labor senator Deborah O’Neill has an ad, as does state Shooters, Fishers and Farmer’s MP Roy Butler.
Local supermarkets IGA and Foodland are back, after reducing advertising earlier because they didn’t need it during the hoarding panic a few weeks back.
There’s an ad from CBH Resources’ Broken Hill operations. There’s also an article by Bob Besley, former managing director of CBH, and Ian Plimer, former director of the company, explaining the history of its operations.
Local newspaper can sometimes become too cosy with advertisers, but Schmidt says there’s been no deal to publish favourable stories in return for advertising. “There was nothing that said, we want these stories, or [we] won’t give [you] the money,” but he would consider publishing stories about the companies if editors think they are warranted.
Schmidt has been overwhelmed by the community support for the Barrier Daily Truth.
A man offered to pay $5 for the paper – it costs just $1.60. Cakes have been sent in, and cards from people like Margaret, who wrote “thanks for reopening, I miss my paper”. He doesn’t know if the paper will ever resume publishing six days a week. It depends on whether local businesses – bars and clubs and restaurants – can reopen profitably after the pandemic eases. In a local town, everyone depends on each other. But Schmidt, still a little stressed, is grateful for the rallying behind his newspaper.
“It’s been an awesome response from all of the people.”