The implications of COVID-19 on regional journalism in far north Queensland: Measuring the heart rate of local communities

In 2020, COVID-19 thrust newsrooms into lockdown, affecting how journalists source, gather and report news. According to media giant News Corp, the pandemic fast-tracked its axing of more than 112 community newspapers, already vulnerable following a decade of gradual decline exacerbated by the arrival of digital technology. Consequently, hundreds of jobs were slashed and ‘news deserts’ were created across vast swathes of rural Australia, including far north Queensland. This article looks closely at the mediascape in far north Queensland from a journalism industry perspective during COVID-19, a time which saw a raft of differing and, sometimes, conflicting pressures exerted on journalists – from complying with health and safety regulations to fulfilling the community’s insatiable hunger for information. Through an online survey and long-form interviews with journalists, the study informing this article focuses on what happens when newsrooms are centralized, diminished in resources and the most senior journalists are made redundant and, as such, no longer available to mentor or control journalistic quality. It also observes the arrival of a new and independent press or ‘green shoots’ while casting an eye on the future of local news.