This appeared on the Liverpool Echo’s twitter feed the other day…

Now, apart from this not actually being even in the ballpark of news or even newsworthy for that matter, I find this really odd coming from the Liverpool Echo, to say the least!

This is a local paper that has, quite rightly, since Hillsborough stood against The S*n, Kelvin McKenzie and the gutter journalism that followed that tragedy. Yet here is the Echo acting as if it was some shoddy, gutter tabloid clone.

The full article wouldn’t look out of place in The S*n, The Star or the Daily Mail. “Paddy McGuinness’ Scouse wife shows off her amazing figure in series of selfies”, enthuses the headline. “The mum-of-two showed off her rock hard abs and peachy posterior in the shots,” it continues with all the jaw dropping pictures . “Christine shared a snap in a tiny neon pink sports bra and knickers…In another revealing shot, the former Miss Liverpool rocked a matching black sports bra and knickers as she insisted that: “Sweat is sexy”.”

This from the paper who revelled in The S*n’s apparent axing of Page 3. Their regular columnist Paddy Shennan in an article about this talks of surprise that “the paper was still stuck in its own perverted time warp” and likens the S*n’s stance on Page 3 to a line from a Billy Bragg song, “It Says Here” – “Where they offer you a feature on stockings and suspenders, next to a call for stiffer penalties for sex offenders.” In the meantime, whilst Shennan declares “women are still fighting for equality” we at least can take heart in Christine’s revealing tiny neon pink sports bra and knickers!

Perhaps the Echo should just be more honest and say something like, “Phwooaarrrrr! Readers chance to ogle over semi-naked celebrity wife! All the revealing, saucy, sexy shots here after all it’s OK you didn’t have to buy The S*n for them!”

What next for the Liverpool Echo? Quite apart from the mindless ramblings of whoever Pete Price happens to have met this week and has deemed his latest “celebrity friend” or who can forget “model and columnist” Amanda Harrington’s take on the issues of the day such as her “fantastic teeth whitening treatment.” How we miss Amanda’s musings. She may have been no Christopher Maloney, (incidentally, he has his own talent school. Oh the irony!) but she knew lots of words. Perhaps as many as 70.

If the Liverpool Echo is serious about its core values such as “Stand up for Liverpool and its people” and “Build trust and respect with our readers” then it can’t in the same breath churn out garbage that without the Echo banner wouldn’t look out of place in those papers that have done so much damage to Liverpool and its people over the years.