Thread by @paulfwebster

Here's why I think the proposed sale of the Observer to Tortoise would severely damage the reputation of the Scott Trust and threaten the future of the world's oldest Sunday newspaper, which I edited until last weekend 🧵

This planned sale, if ratified by the Trust, would be a discreditable conclusion to a damaging episode in the company's history.

It is based on two false premises. One, that the Observer represents a serious threat to the security and future of the Guardian because of its financial position.

This is preposterous. As editor for the past 6 years, I was provided with  revenue and expenditure data.

They showed that despite the well-documented decline of print sales, The Observer has continued to make a net contribution of several millions of pounds to the company's finances.

Even once added expenses are included, as they have been in the company's recent shameful attempt to bundle the paper out of the door as quickly as possible, and account is taken of shared resources we use, the losses are miniscule set against the company's £1.3 bn cash pile.

And they fail to take any account of mitigating strategies we might have discussed, but which the Trust entirely failed to consider during my tenure, or of the considerable contribution Observer journalism makes to the Guardian website's breadth of coverage and income.

The second false premise is that Tortoise Media, a small historically loss making start up, is able to sustain the Observer as a serious competitor on Sunday newstands.

Based on the little information Observer journalists have been provided with it does not have the resources to shoulder the cost of sustaining a standalone Sunday paper with a comprehensive news, foreign, sports, business and cultural coverage able to compete with our rivals.

Nor are its projections of subscription sales realistic, and uncertainty clouds the scale and future of its funding.

The Scott Trust boasts a proud record of defending liberal journalism, as represented by both the Guardian AND the Observer. It appears as if it’s about to betray that record by essentially gifting the Observer to a small, historically loss-making start-up.

If its losses are severe enough to warrant abandoning the Observer then it is doubtful that Tortoise has the means to sustain the title. If they are not, then the Trust, with a £1.3bn endowment, is a far better home for the Observer.

The Guardian persistently boasts that it’s not owned by a proprietor. But - by excluding its own journalists from the process of the sale - it has behaved as if it is.

As a senior journalist on the Guardian and Observer for 35  years, I believe the Scott Trust should reject this deal and embark on a proper review of the Observer's future if it is to uphold its clearly enunciated role as a defender of liberal journalism at home and abroad,