In its preliminary statement, the company's profit was £8.2m, up 157% on the £2.9m it recorded in 2009. Turnover fell 1.9% from £142m to £139.3m.

However, newspaper revenue fell 5.9% to £92.6m, although the company claimed this was due to a "significant reduction" in public sector advertising.

The company, along with the majority of the UK's newspaper print and publishing sector, has undertaken a series of cost-reduction measures in recent years.

Its magazine division increased turnover to £44.9m, a 3% rise. Chairman Richard Jewson said that this was down to subscription copy sales, which were up 9.9% for the year.

Jewson said: "A notable achievement was that two of our daily newspaper titles and half the paid-for weekly titles outside London achieved circulation growth in the second half of 2010 as compared to 2009.

"In England, our two Norfolk daily titles, in terms of circulation, were the best performing regional newspapers while all four daily regional titles were in the top eight."

Last month the company proposed the closure of part of its Thorpe Print Centre, with a view to contracting out some of its titles.