THE OPENING of this wonderful new plant and building represents a commitment by the company to the support given by the staff and the community.

Such is the speed of technology advance, it is really no time at all since we moved from the 60-year-old Crabtree press in the dark, inky bowels of Mealhouse Lane.

Up until 1987, production staff, using amazing skill and dexterity, moved molten metal from the linotype machines to cast the heavy metal pages that were then bolted to the press.

Life changed when we moved to Lostock and gleaming new web offset presses that offered full colour. They were then state-of-the-art.

Now we leap forward yet again to a stunning new press in which pages are made up on a computer terminal and then electronically transferred to a plate at the side of the press.

Quite incredibly, running at a speed of 60,000 copies an hour, it can produce papers up to 196 pages -- very different from the 16-page press that ran in the early 1900s.

From my years working in Lancashire, I'm aware how everyone in the area is just as proud of their local newspaper as they are of their town's history.

Our newspapers share this proud heritage with their local communities and, with the very latest newspaper technology, they will continue to be their consciousness and voice.

Jim Brown

Chairman, Newsquest Media Group