1. About these Terms
These Terms of Use govern access to and use of:
- the Proximity News Network website;
- every regional, local, industry and specialist publication website owned, controlled or operated by Proximity News Network Ltd; and
- any associated pages, newsletters, applications or digital services that link to these Terms,
together referred to as the “Websites.”
These Terms apply across the Proximity News Network, including where a publication links or redirects to the Policies & Legal section on the Proximity News Network website. A current list of publications within the Network is available on our Our Brands page.
Each publication operates under the central legal, editorial and operational policies of Proximity News Network Ltd. Although publications may have distinct names, audiences, geographical coverage and editorial areas, they form part of the same publishing network and are not separate legal entities unless expressly stated otherwise.
Unless a Website states otherwise, references in these Terms to the “Network,” “Proximity News Network,” “we,” “us” or “our” mean Proximity News Network Ltd and the publications, Websites and services it owns, controls or operates.
By accessing or using any of the Websites, you agree to be bound by these Terms. If you do not agree to them, you should not access or use the Websites.
Additional terms may apply to particular services, advertising arrangements, competitions, paid products or subscriptions. Where additional terms conflict with these Terms, the more specific terms will apply to the relevant service.
The Websites are owned and operated by:
Proximity News Network Ltd
Registered in England and Wales
Company number: 17340580
Registered office: 124 City Road, London, United Kingdom, EC1V 2NX
3. Permitted use
You may access and use the Websites for lawful personal, informational and internal business purposes.
You may:
- read and view publicly available content;
- share links to our articles;
- quote limited extracts where permitted by law, provided that the quotation is accurate, proportionate, properly attributed and accompanied by a link to the original article where reasonably possible;
- print or download a reasonable number of articles for personal, non-commercial use; and
- use sharing tools provided on the Websites.
You must not use the Websites in a manner that infringes our rights, interferes with their operation or causes harm to us, our readers or any other person.
4. Intellectual property
Unless otherwise stated, all copyright, database rights, design rights, trade marks and other intellectual-property rights in the Websites and their content belong to Proximity News Network Ltd, its licensors or the relevant credited rights holder.
Protected material may include:
- articles, headlines and written content;
- original reporting and compilations;
- photographs, illustrations, graphics and video;
- publication names, logos and branding;
- databases, classifications and metadata;
- website design, layout and software; and
- Newsletters and other editorial products.
No ownership rights are transferred to you by your use of the Websites.
Publication names and logos may not be used in a manner that suggests sponsorship, endorsement, partnership or affiliation without our written permission.
5. Republishing and commercial reuse
Except where permitted by law or authorised by us in writing, you must not:
- reproduce complete articles or substantial parts of articles;
- republish our content on another website, app, publication, database or platform;
- sell, license, syndicate or commercially exploit our content;
- systematically copy headlines, summaries, metadata, photographs or other material;
- create a competing publication, database or service using our content;
- remove copyright notices, credits, watermarks or source information;
- frame or mirror substantial portions of a Website; or
- imply that our content was produced by, approved by or affiliated with another organisation.
Nothing in these Terms restricts a use that is expressly permitted by applicable law and cannot lawfully be excluded.
6. Scraping, automated access and artificial-intelligence training
You must not, without our prior written permission:
- scrape, crawl, harvest, extract or download content at scale;
- use bots, scripts, automated agents or similar technology to access or copy the Websites;
- circumvent technical access controls, rate limits, robots instructions or security measures;
- aggregate our content into a commercial service;
- use our content to train, develop, test, fine-tune or supply a commercial artificial-intelligence or machine-learning system;
- create embeddings, datasets, knowledge bases or derivative models from substantial quantities of our content; or
- use automated methods that place an unreasonable burden on our infrastructure.
This restriction does not apply to ordinary search-engine indexing that complies with our technical instructions, approved feed readers, services expressly authorised by us, or activity permitted by law that cannot be excluded.
We may restrict or block automated access where we reasonably believe these Terms have been breached.
7. Accuracy and editorial content
We aim to publish accurate and responsibly produced material. However, news develops quickly and content may contain errors, omissions or information that later changes.
We do not promise that every item will be:
- complete;
- continuously updated;
- free from error;
- suitable for a particular purpose; or
- available indefinitely.
Publication of an allegation, quotation, opinion or third-party statement does not mean that Proximity News Network endorses it.
Headlines, summaries, alerts and social-media posts should be read together with the full article and available context.
Information may be corrected, clarified, updated, archived or removed at any time.
8. No professional advice
Content on the Websites is published for general information and journalistic purposes.
It is not intended to constitute legal, financial, investment, medical, tax, employment, safety or other professional advice. You should obtain appropriate professional advice before acting or refraining from acting on information that may affect your rights, health, finances, business or personal circumstances.
Market figures, prices, availability and other time-sensitive information may change after publication.
9. External links and third-party services
The Websites may link to websites, documents, embedded content or services operated by third parties.
A link does not necessarily mean that we:
- endorse the third party;
- have verified everything on the linked service;
- accept responsibility for its content; or
- have an ongoing commercial relationship with it.
Third-party websites operate under their own terms and privacy practices. We are not responsible for loss arising solely from your use of a third-party service, except where applicable law provides otherwise.
10. Reader submissions and correspondence
Where you submit information, photographs, documents, comments, story suggestions, corrections, complaints or other material, you confirm that:
- you have the right to submit it;
- it is not knowingly false, unlawful or misleading;
- it does not infringe another person’s intellectual-property, privacy or confidentiality rights;
- submitting it does not breach a court order, contractual duty or legal restriction; and
- you have not obtained it through unlawful access, hacking or deception.
Unless agreed otherwise, you grant Proximity News Network Ltd a non-exclusive, worldwide, royalty-free licence to review, copy, store, edit and use submitted material for editorial, evidential, administrative and publication purposes.
This licence does not require us to publish the material and does not prevent you from using it elsewhere.
We may contact you to verify information. We will consider requests for confidentiality, but confidentiality must be expressly agreed and may be subject to legal obligations.
Do not send information that presents an immediate risk to life through an ordinary contact form. Contact the emergency services where appropriate.
11. Prohibited conduct
You must not:
- use the Websites unlawfully or fraudulently;
- attempt to gain unauthorised access to our systems;
- introduce malware or harmful code;
- carry out denial-of-service activity;
- impersonate another person or misrepresent your affiliation;
- submit threatening, abusive, discriminatory or defamatory material;
- interfere with another person’s use of the Websites;
- use contact details obtained from the Websites for unsolicited marketing;
- manipulate engagement, advertising or analytics systems; or
- use the Websites in a way that could expose us or another person to legal or regulatory liability.
We may report suspected criminal activity or security incidents to the appropriate authorities.
13. Gifts, support payments and other payments
Where a Website allows readers to make a voluntary gift or support payment:
- the payment is made to Proximity News Network Ltd unless stated otherwise;
- it is not a charitable donation;
- it does not qualify for Gift Aid or charitable tax relief;
- it does not purchase editorial influence, favourable reporting or a right to control content;
- it does not create shares, membership rights or ownership in the company; and
- it does not create a continuing subscription unless that is clearly stated before payment.
Payments may be processed by a third-party payment provider. We do not normally receive or store complete payment-card details.
We may consider refund requests for duplicate, unauthorised or clearly erroneous payments. Nothing in this section affects rights that cannot lawfully be excluded.
14. Advertising arrangements
Advertising, sponsorship and commercial-content arrangements may be governed by separate written terms agreed with the advertiser or agency.
Submission of an advertising enquiry does not oblige us to accept a campaign or publish content.
Our approach to advertising and sponsored material is explained in our Sponsored Content Policy.
15. Website availability and security
We may change, suspend, restrict or discontinue any Website or feature for operational, security, legal or editorial reasons.
We do not guarantee uninterrupted or error-free access. You are responsible for using appropriate security software and maintaining backups of material that is important to you.
16. Our liability
Nothing in these Terms excludes or limits liability where doing so would be unlawful, including liability for:
- death or personal injury caused by negligence;
- fraud or fraudulent misrepresentation; or
- any other liability that cannot lawfully be excluded.
If you are a consumer, your statutory rights are not affected.
Subject to those protections, we are not responsible for loss arising from:
- reliance on content that is provided for general information;
- information becoming outdated after publication;
- interruption or unavailability of a Website;
- third-party websites or services;
- malware introduced by a third party despite reasonable precautions; or
- use of the Websites in breach of these Terms.
If you use the Websites for business purposes, Proximity News Network Ltd will not be liable for loss of profit, revenue, business opportunity, anticipated savings, goodwill or indirect or consequential business loss, except where liability cannot lawfully be excluded.
The law restricts attempts to exclude liability for death or personal injury caused by negligence and requires consumer terms to remain fair and transparent.
17. Suspension and enforcement
We may suspend, restrict or terminate access where we reasonably believe that:
- these Terms have been breached;
- access creates a security or operational risk;
- unlawful activity has occurred;
- our intellectual-property rights are being infringed; or
- restriction is necessary to protect another person or comply with law.
Failure to enforce a provision immediately does not waive our right to enforce it later.
18. Changes to these Terms
We may update these Terms to reflect changes in law, technology, services or business operations.
The current version will be published on this page with its effective date. Material changes will apply from the date stated and will not retrospectively remove rights that have already arisen.
19. Governing law
These Terms are governed by the law of England and Wales.
The courts of England and Wales will have jurisdiction, except that consumers may retain the right to bring proceedings in another part of the United Kingdom or another jurisdiction where mandatory law permits.