National newspaper spend: FOI release

Information requested

1. The total value of news subscriptions paid for the National newspaper by the Scottish Government in 2022-23, 2023-24 and 2024-25 so far. Where possible, please breakdown these payments by the directorate responsible for paying these subscriptions too.

2. Of the media monitoring services the Scottish Government pays for, whether any extra charge is imposed for including the output of the National into these media monitoring services and if so how much additional cost this adds to the overall amount paid for its current media monitoring services.

Response

1. The Scottish Government has a contract with Office Papers to supply newspapers on an ad-hoc rather than a subscription basis. This allows titles to be cancelled when not required, for example during Parliamentary recesses. Costs for The National under the contract are in the table below:

Title	FY 22-23	FY 23-24	FY 24-25 (up to end of Jan 25)
The National	£768.18	£897.50	£786.39

All purchases were made by the Directorate for Communications and Ministerial Support.

2. As part of the Media Services Framework used by the Scottish Government, newspaper articles relevant to Government ministers and policies are provided by the contractor from a range of titles, including The National. There are no extra charges imposed for including articles of any one particular newspaper title; costs per article provided are the same regardless of which newspaper it has been published in.

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