The move by local authorities, on which the Scottish Government plans to follow suit, could represent a significant loss of revenues for Scottish newspapers. The newspaper industry currently benefits from £47m a year in public sector advertising revenues. The news comes amidst falling newspaper sales and gloomy forecasts for the future of the industry. Figures show that over the past 20 years the Daily Record’s sales have fallen by 48.6 per cent, the Herald’s by 46.4 per cent and the Scotsman’s by 41.5 per cent.

The decision by COSLA follows a concerted drive towards efficiency savings by local authorities in order to meet the 2 per cent efficiency savings targets and make better use of council tax. The transfer to the COSLA jobs site and local authorities’ own websites is expected to initially save £5m.

The ‘soft launch’ of the COSLA jobs portal will take place on the 29th of May. As well as saving money, the new site is designed to create a specific local government recruitment brand and attract a higher quality of candidate. The site is also intended to implement a more efficient approach to secession planning – ensuring the right people are in place within the organisation to move into top jobs.

The transfer to the COSLA portal marks an end to automatic advertising of council jobs within the commercial sector. A blanket ban on newspaper advertising will not be imposed however and newspaper recruitment pages will remain part of a wider package of options for local authorities, with the COSLA site being the most obvious choice.

The move follows Holyrood magazine’s own launch of a free job – Holyrood Jobs - recruitment website for public sector, charity and third sector vacancies. The site is completely free to registered employers. The website was launched in March following a concern that public sector vacancies were not adequately catered for by commercial job sites and a demand for a public sector recruitment site in Scotland with a single focus and online visibility. The free site can be found at www.holyrood.com/jobs.