According to the Local Media Association (LMA), which includes leading players Johnston Press, Trinity Mirror, Daily Mail and General Trust and Newsquest among its ranks, publishers should be allowed regional newspaper monopolies.

They argue that newspapers are having to compete against television, radio and the internet for readers, and that the currently ruling, which dictates that a publisher can only have 25% of newspaper advertising in a specific region, is antiquated and does not take this into account.

Former Johnston Press chairman Roger Parry, who is set to leave the company next month, has been appointed as chairman of the LMA.

He told PrintWeek: "The LMA believes that current market definitions used by OFT need to be modernised to reflect growth on internet, low-cost digital publishing and increased inventory/low costs of other media.

"Working with the OFT, we have designed a survey and done 5,000 interviews to get the latest information on how the market really functions. We hope that Lord Carter's Digital Britain report will call for changes in merger rules."

Digital Britain is a report into digital communication in the UK, developed by Stephen Carter, the first Minister for Communications, Technology and Broadcasting.

If a change in regulation is pushed through Parliament as a result, it could potentially lead to a restructuring of ownership of the portfolios of regional titles and large cities could see major newspapers closed or merged.

Media speculation has already identified titles, such as the Birmingham Post and Birmingham Mail, the Yorkshire Post and the Glasgow Herald, which could change hands.

In the last year more than 1,000 jobs have gone in the newspaper sector. Most of these are editorial jobs, but there have also been a large number of knock-on redundancies in the print sector.

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