‘Major victory’ in Record work-to-rule

A THREE-WEEK work-to-rule at the Daily Record and Sunday Mail in Glasgow won NUJ members new talks to end chronic staffing shortages that were posing a risk to journalists’ health and safety.

Staff working to the terms of their contract — taking all their breaks, sticking to their contracted hours and refusing to cover other journalists’ work.

They caused huge disruption to production of the papers until managers agreed to talks on the introduction of a new multimedia content system.

After three weeks of work-to-rule every edition of the Daily Record was either cancelled or late and managers asked for talks. The action was suspended and it was agreed there will be no more job cuts until the new system is introduced and there will be retraining and redeployment into areas where people are overstretched.

Scottish organiser Paul Holleran said: “It is a major victory. We have shown they can’t produce the papers without our goodwill.

“There are 20 vacancies but all we were looking for was two specific jobs to be filled — both sub-editors.

“This is a health and safety issue as there’s a lot of people not taking breaks. We’ve had people off long-term sick with stress.

“Trinity Mirror needs to stop chasing its share price and instead concentrate on investing in quality newspapers that will deliver long-term profits,” said Paul Holleran. “The company needs to put money into journalism if it is to deliver a sustainable future for its newspaper businesses.”