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|---|---|
| Type | Sunday newspaper |
| Format | Tabloid |
| Owner | News Limited |
| Editor | Christopher Dore |
| Founded | February 1897 (as West Australian Sunday Times) |
| Circulation | 282,585[1] |
| Sister newspapers |  The Daily Telegraph Herald Sun The Courier-Mail Sunday Mail |
| ISSN | 1442-9527 |
| Official website | www.news.com.au/perthnow/ |
The Sunday Times, owned by News Limited, is a tabloid Sunday newspaper printed in Perth and distributed throughout Western Australia.
Contents |
History [edit]
Established by Frederick Vosper in the 1890s, The Sunday Times became a vehicle for the harassment of C. Y. O'Connor and the proposed Goldfields Water Supply Scheme in the late 1890s until O'Connor's death by suicide in 1902. A subsequent government inquiry found no justification for Vosper's campaign against O'Connor.
The paper was purchased from Vosper's estate by James MacCallum Smith and Arthur Reid in 1901. In 1912 MacCallum Smith became sole proprietor and managing director, remaining in that role until 1935, as well as being a member of the Western Australian Legislative Assembly for 20 years.
In 1935, a syndicate led by Jack Simons and including Victor Courtney and mining entrepreneur Claude de Bernales purchased Western Press Limited, the publisher of the paper, for £55,000. Simons was chairman and managing director until his death in 1949 when Courtney took control.[2] In 1955 Courtney sold Western Press to Rupert Murdoch's News Limited.
Current format and circulation [edit]
To counter perceived decreasing demand for newspapers and competition from radio, television and internet news, The Sunday Times has made adaptations in style and presentation but remains a populist tabloid rather than a newspaper of record. Sunday monopoly status ensures statewide circulation for its extensive display- and classified-advertising content, making it probably the most profitable newspaper in Australia.
The paper's audited circulation was 282,585 in 2011.[1]
In June 2006, The Sunday Times launched PerthNow, an online presentation of local news from News Limited.[3]
Recent editors have been Don Smith from 1987, Brian Crisp from 1999, Brett McCarthy from 2001, and Sam Weir from June 2007. As of November 2012[update], Christopher Dore is the editor of The Sunday Times and PerthNow.[4]
Competition-free status [edit]
Western Australia's diminutive population has not enjoyed a competitive Sunday newspaper since The Independent was bought out by News Limited in 1984 and wound up in May 1986.
Before 1990, Perth had competitive Saturday newspapers (Weekend News and Western Mail (1980-1988)), as well as weekday morning and afternoon dailies (The West Australian and Daily News respectively). However, there appears to be a long-standing reciprocal arrangement that the publishers of The West Australian and The Sunday Times do not compete directly with each other's diurnal circulation, though Saturday's West is obliged to share the state's very lucrative weekend classified-advertising market with The Sunday Times. A small-circulation state edition of Murdoch's national daily The Australian is printed at The Sunday Times, targeting an elite readership group in a way which does not seriously impinge on the more demotic audience of The West Australian.
A joint venture between the two companies produces nearly all of Perth's local newspapers.
2008 leak controversy [edit]
On 30 April 2008, members of the police fraud squad conducted a raid on the offices of The Sunday Times—an unusual event for Australian mainstream media—following a state government complaint that confidential cabinet information had been leaked to the paper.[5][6] An upper-house select committee inquiry[7] subsequently found that no direction had been given to police by any minister, parliamentarian or staffer; and that "the police over-reacted in what should have been a routine search".[8] The committee's findings included criticism of the Department of Premier and Cabinet and the Corruption and Crime Commission. It also recommended "that the Attorney General continue to pursue the introduction of shield laws for journalists".
See also [edit]
References [edit]
- ^ a b The Sunday Times at NewsSpace (a News Ltd website)
- ^ G.C. Bolton. "Courtney, Victor Desmond (1894 - 1970)". Australian Dictionary of Biography. Retrieved 2008-10-14.
- ^ PerthNow website
- ^ Christopher Dore appointed editor for The Sunday Times, PerthNow at PerthNow, 18 April 2012
- ^ ABC News WA Police raid Sunday Times newspaper office 30 April 2008
- ^ AAP report MPs to investigate raid on WA newspaper Sydney Morning Herald, 8 May 2008
- ^ WA Legislative Council Report of Select Committee into the Police Raid on the Sunday Times April 2009
- ^ ABC News Raid on The Sunday Times an 'over-reaction' 9 April 2009
Further reading [edit]
- Dunn, Frank (1997) A Century of Sundays Perth, W.A. Sunday Times. ISBN 0-646-33801-3
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