John Lennon, managing director of the Association of Convenience Stores’ newspaper and magazine policy arm, has been made redundant.

The Association of News Retailing let Lennon go with immediate effect as part of a reorganisation that sees his work taken over by the ACS public affairs team, headed by public affairs director Shane Brennan.

“We are sad to part company with Lennon, who has played such a massive role in establishing ANR as a credible, constructive and strong champion of news retailers,” said ACS chief executive James Lowman.

Lowman insisted the move did not signal a slackening of the body’s lobbying efforts on newspaper and magazine issues.  

Among Lennon’s last tasks in the role was to agree a voluntary code of practice to reduce the amount of sexualised content available to children. The informal code includes agreeing to ensure so-called ‘lads mags’ are not displayed within easy reach of youngsters of alongside publications targeting children.

Read more
New voluntary code of practice for lads mags (Convenience Store; 7 June 2011)
Retail associations hit out at ‘failure’ of PDF (14 May 2011)

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