THERE is a tendency in some quarters to be rather snobbish about local newspapers.

Some think that local papers do no more than print photographs of church fetes and record the deaths of local notables. Yet, in my experience, the news that appears in a quality local paper like the Gazette can have far more relevance to the daily lives of local people than any amount of the celebrity gossip that fills so much of our national press.

A controversial planning application or a row about traffic-calming can keep the letters page going for weeks, and will stir far more passion than a government Green Paper or ministerial resignation.

The Gazette played a very important part in the campaign of Robert and Gill Smith for a change in the law regarding the use of DNA evidence in police investigations, following the murder of their teenage daughter, Louise.

This was a complex issue to which the Gazette devoted considerable space and this helped the family to collect the signatures of approaching 10,000 local people. I was able to take the case to Parliament, and now the law has finally been changed. Without the careful explanation of the issues and regular updates on the campaign carried by the Gazette, I am not sure that this could have been achieved.

The Gazette owes its tremendous longevity to being a truly local paper. If people in Thornbury want people to know of an event they are putting on, the first place they head for is the Gazette office in High Street, and the same is true for the edition serving the Yate and Chipping Sodbury area.

To survive for 125 years, the Gazette has certainly had to change with the times. But the timeless values of providing truly local news in a reliable and readable way have served the paper well and will continue to do so for many years to come.