AS a Londoner moving to the north in the 1980s, I was immediately struck by the huge influence of the local press within Bury.

Everybody referred to it and 30 years later, I believe that the paper has played a key role in maintaining a special cohesion and an old world, family identity to the town.

Given this influence and the fact that Bury North was once a key marginal parliamentary seat, I was surprised and then hugely disappointed last Thursday to see the front page of the paper urging support for a political party.

Of course, this was a mock page and a form of advertising, but the purpose of this method is of course to give the impression that the advert is headline news.

I would therefore like to ask how the Bury Times equates this false front page with the editor's comments under the heading Fighting Fake News where he informs readers of how the Bury Times looks to promoting "local journalism as opposed to distributing fake news to profit from opaque programmatic advertising".

The front page last Thursday could lead readers, urged by their trusted local paper, to vote for Theresa May, to ask further questions.

They may well wish to know whether the large sum spent on such a front cover and no doubt replicated across the country, could not have been used by Tory donors to help prevent library closures; prevent children being sent to overcrowded schools making redundancies to teachers and teaching assistants; prevent the further disintegration of social care and support for mental health or to fill the pot holes that we jolt through each day.

I would be equally dismayed to see such a false front page if printed on behalf of the weakened opposition.

However, this sad state of affairs gives even more reason to question Mike Crutchley's proud boast that " Newspapers such as the Bury Times uphold, promote and support local democracy".

The Times Comment in the Opinion section was "Election coverage will be fair and balanced". Last Thursday was not a good start!

Chris Ashley

Bury