Burgeoning growth on the internet helped overcome a slump in newspapers to lift overall spending on advertising in the UK by 4.2 per cent last year, figures released on Monday showed.

The Advertising Association released its statistics for the year showing that the press remained the premier market for advertisers, with £7.71bn ($15.2bn) of the total of £19.4bn spent in newspapers and magazines – down 1.9 per cent on 2006. Figures from newspaper companies for the first five months of this year suggest the decline will sharpen in 2008.