The UK government department DCMS asked Dame Frances Cairncross to lead a Review looking into the sustainability of the local press in the UK. As with similar processes in other countries, while the question of financing and sustainability was core to her influential final report, the Review ended up having to consider much deeper questions and issues, including having to come up with a definition of public interest news:
This Review argues that there are two areas of public-interest news that matter greatly. Each is often of limited interest to the public, but both are essential in a healthy democracy.
One is investigative and campaigning journalism, and especially investigations into abuses of power in both the public and the private sphere. Such journalism is particularly high-cost and high-risk.
The second is the humdrum task of reporting on the daily activities of public institutions, particularly those at local level, such as the discussions of local councils or the proceedings in a local Magistrates Court. Reporting on the machinery of government and justice matters at a national level too, but it is in greater danger locally, mainly because the size of the potential audience for local issues is so much smaller, and thus inevitably attracts less financial support from readers.
Cairncross Review – Final Report, p17
Public Interest News 