Court OK's new National Post ownership structure

An Ontario court approved a new ownership structure for the National Post on Friday, heading off the shut downof its operations.

Owner Canwest Global will be allowed to shuffle the newspaper into a group alongside its other daily newspapers, a move it said would be the best hope for saving the paper from going under.

Canwest has been restructuring under protection from its creditors and had asked to put the money-losing Post into the Canwest Limited Partnership which is not among divisions of the company currently operating under creditor protection in order to save cash.

The partnershipincludes the Montreal Gazette, Vancouver's Sun and Province papers and the Ottawa Citizen.

A lawyer for Canwest, Lyndon Barnes, had told court earlier Friday that the move was essential to restructuring the whole company because the businesses of all the newspapers are highly integrated.

"Without these agreements," said Barnes, "the ability to restructure either of these entities is in doubt."

The Post employs 277 people. The national daily was founded in 1998 bythe Southam group of newspapers then led by businessman Conrad Black.

In a court filing earlier this week, the company had warned that shifting the Post into the Canwest Limited Partnership was essential to its survival, and important to its other newspapers and media properties.

Canwest, which also operates the Global TV network, is restructuring under protection from creditors after racking up a $4-billion debt.