The Northern Echo is to cut 18 staff as part of plans to cut the paper down to a single edition, the NUJ claims.
Some of the cuts at the Newsquest-owned paper could be voluntary and some employees will be offered early retirement, it is understood.
Drivers and production staff will be most affected, although one vacant editorial post will not be filled.
The paper’s last deadline is expected to change from 1.30am to 10.30pm.
Chris Morley, the NUJ’s northern organiser, said: ‘As far as the chapel is concerned it’s going to the heart of what of what they do as a major regional newspaper. It will be far less flexible with these redundancies and later print deadlines.”
Echo editor Peter Barron was unavailable for comment.
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