Against a backdrop of sales in Scotland continuing to drop for national daily newspapers, there was some consolation that their year-on-year declines for December 2010-last month were not quite as severe as they had been for November 2010-November 2011. 

And according to the latest set of figures issued by the Audit Bureau of Circulation, in the case of the Scottish Daily Mail, there was even a slight increase: of 2.1 per cent.

And once again, several Sunday newspapers have benefitted from the demise, in July, of the News of the World. This time around, The Sunday Post turned a year-on-year drop of 1.2 per cent (from November 2010 to November 2011) to a 0.6 per cent increase.

The daily figures - issued at midday - concern sales in Scotland between December 2010 and last month and reveal the following:

Daily Mirror - 5.2 per cent drop = from 22,837 on average in December 2010, to 21,641 last month;

Daily Record - 5.3 per drop = from 277,899 on average in December 2010, to 263,251 last month;

Daily Star of Scotland - 9.9 per cent drop = 66,803 to 60,145;

The Scottish Sun - 3.8 per cent drop = 314,897 to 302,823;

Scottish Daily Express - 4.7 per cent drop = 65,768 to 62,638;

Scottish Daily Mail - 2.1 per cent up = 105,193 to 107,390;

Daily Telegraph - 1.3 per cent drop = 18,882 to 18,638;

Financial Times - 4.7 per cent drop = 3,641 to 3,470;

The Herald - 9.9 per cent drop = 51,286 to 46,215;

The Guardian - 1.9 per cent drop = 12,921 to 12,677;

Independent - 16.5 per cent drop = 7,765 to 6,485;

The Scotsman - 6.1 per cent drop = 40,658 to 38,159; and

The Times - six per cent drop = 20,321 to 19,103.

Meanwhile, the Sunday titles' sales figures in Scotland continued to be a more mixed bag:

Daily Star of Scotland - Sunday - 122.6 per cent up = 25,625 to 57,037;

Sunday Mail - 4.1 per cent up = 338,508 to 352,285;

Sunday Mirror - 70 per cent up = 22,640 to 38,561;

The People - 87.2 per cent up = 12,264 to 22,957;

Scottish Sunday Express - 18.6 per cent up = 35,154 to 41,708;

The Sunday Post - 0.6 per cent up = 215,387 to 216,717;

Scottish Mail on Sunday - 0.02 per cent down = 98,312 to 98,288;

Independent on Sunday - 10.2 per cent up = 6,123 to 6,750;

The Observer - 1.2 per cent down = 16,952 to 16,744;

Scotland on Sunday - 5.7 per cent down = 45,996 to 43,369;

Sunday Herald - 27.6 per cent down = 39,687 to 28,708;

Sunday Telegraph - 3.2 per cent down = 16,864 to 16,328; and

Sunday Times - 9.5 per cent down = 56,884 to 51,455.