Beware supermarket paper chase

If the Office of Fair Trading allows supermarkets to control the distribution of newspapers to local newsagents it will lead, inevitably, to an even faster demise of the little shops that provide such a good service. In the long run it won't benefit readers and will accelerate decline in newspaper production too. When I investigated Tesco's poor newspaper-sales service last year I discovered just how little the company cares about papers, even in their own stores. If they win national distribution contracts they'll surely treat the small guys with disdain. The current system IS monopolistic. But it works. There's another thing to watch out for too, a possible link between a chain like Tesco's and a giant print combine like News International. Are they up to something? We should be told.