Reach claims industry first after creating Online Safety Editor role

Reach, the Daily Mirror and Daily Express publisher, has created a new online safety editor role to support journalists being abused and press social media platforms to take action.

Following an internal survey answered by over 550 employees, a taskforce of senior editorial and HR leaders at Reach decided to dedicate a role in which the person will support employees receiving abuse or harassment as a result of their job.

The online safety editor will not only implement the online abuse guidelines and support employees but also lead efforts to prevent further abuse.

Reach announced the role’s creation as the first of job of its kind in the UK news media industry.

The online safety editor will be expected to lead discussions with Facebook, Twitter and other social media platforms, in order to resolve individual cases and pressing for action to improve the problem.

Group Editor-in-Chief Lloyd Embley said: “Online abuse has become endemic in our industry. It can severely impact the mental health of our journalists and at times even threatens their physical safety. While we have always had a system in place to support and protect our colleagues, we felt that with online abuse only increasing across the industry we needed to dedicate a role to tackle it head on.

“We will not allow our journalism to be silenced or our colleagues to live in fear.”

The new role will sit in the Reach Audience team, reporting to audience transformation director Martin Little. She or he will be charged with supporting to support any Reach employee from across its national and regional titles.