Media Quotes of the Week: From 'job massacre' at Newsquest newspapers to the journalists who exposed corruption at Tower Hamlets Council

Chris Morley, NUJ Northern and Midlands organiser, in a statement on 30 more proposed job cuts at Newsquest: “The words used by our members following today's announcements are 'shell shocked' and 'job massacre'. After so many casualties and waves of cutbacks at Newsquest centres, it does seem that the company is at war with its staff. "

Laura Davison, NUJ national organiser, objecting to the pay rise for Johnston Press chief Ashley Highfield: "A pay rise of £26,000 is more than the pay of a news editor on some weekly titles in an entire year. The number of jobs axed by JP over the past three years has left staff stressed and newsrooms struggling. That's why Johnston Press NUJ members have called on the directors to give up their bonuses and invest the money in frontline editorial where it matters."

GuardianObserver NUJ ‏@go_NUJ on Twitter: "Johnston Press wants to know #WhatMattersToMe Tell them you want a strong local press with proper pay and staffing levels for journalists."

Paul Dacre, quoted by the Spectator: "All newspapers – I would argue – face the threat of being chained by statutory press controls as an authoritarian state, aided by those giants of rectitude Max Mosley and Hugh Grant – becomes ever more powerful and intolerant of criticism. As it conspires to extend its control over a commercially viable free press which I love because it is beholden to no one and the only genuinely free thing we have left in modern Britain."

The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein in a statement: "“This vicious verbal assault on migrants and asylum seekers in the UK tabloid press has continued unchallenged under the law for far too long. I am an unswerving advocate of freedom of expression, which is guaranteed under Article 19 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), but it is not absolute. Article 20 of the same Covenant says ‘Any advocacy of national, racial or religious hatred that constitutes incitement to discrimination, hostility or violence shall be prohibited by law.’”

Jeremy Paxman interviewed in the Radio Times: "I don't see Newsnight, I'm afraid. My idea of fun is to go to bed at 10.30pm and read a book."

Nick Cohen in the Observer: "Do not forget either that Rahman at all times enjoyed the mulish support of Ken Livingstone and elements of what now passes for the British left. The BBC, the Daily Telegraph, Private Eye and Ted Jeory, a fantastic Tower Hamlets reporter, who exposed on his blog the corruption stories that local papers wouldn’t print, fought back. But with honourable exceptions, London’s leftwing press ignored the stink in its own backyard and dismissed the accusations against Rahman as evidence of a 'deep substrate of' – you guessed it – 'racism'."

Andrew Gilligan in the Telegraph: "Rahman’s removal from office represents a victory for The Telegraph which has tirelessly investigated allegations of corruption and has long called for further scrutiny of Rahman’s office."

Ted Jeory in the Independent: "I started my spare-time blog in 2010 when I realised my former paper, the East London Advertiser, was no longer able or willing to keep an eye on the detail of the council administration. I kept plugging away where it should have been. For that, I received numerous legal threats from the town hall. None succeeded. But the retreat of so many local papers is deeply worrying. How many other Lutfur Rahmans are there out there?"

Daily Mail:  "Journalists rather than police or officials exposed Lutfur Rahman’s corruption – often at personal risk. It was only after dogged investigations by reporters such as Andrew Gilligan and Panorama’s John Ware that the scandal was revealed."