‘Joint action is only way to stop Johnston axe’
NUJ reps from across the Johnston Press regional newspaper empire are planning co-ordinated action against a wave of job cuts.
They have unanimously backed a motion of no confidence in the com pany’s senior management — and urged shareholders and communities to act to save their local papers.
As redundancies, recruitment freezes, budget cuts, title and office closures and the axing of freelances hit Johnston Press newsrooms across the UK and Ireland in August, the NUJ began to plan a co-ordinated, group-wide day of action to highlight the damage being done to local papers.
Members complain that job cuts and the widespread non-replacement of staff are putting intolerable pressures on remaining journalists or leading to situations where papers are unable to cover their local areas.
One title has almost a quarter of editorial posts currently unfilled and reps report that morale across the group is at rock bottom.
NUJ General Secretary Jeremy Dear said the cuts would “threaten the very future of the papers. If you continue to deny resources for editorial you inevitably produce worse products and why would businesses advertise in, or readers buy, such products?
“The strategy of cut, cut, cut in editorial budgets has been shown to be a failure and it’s time it was reversed. Shareholders should be fearful for their investments and local communities should fear for the future of their papers.
“We won’t sit back and allow jobs and quality journalism to be threatened. The mood among our members is one of determination to actively oppose cuts which damage quality, lead to increased workloads, threaten the future of the titles and put at risk more jobs”.
Johnston Press has announced up to 30 redundancies at The Scotsman and Edinburgh Evening News, while journalists working on the Sheffield Star also face a mixture of compulsory and voluntary redundancies.
Johnston Press also said it also intends to close two Scottish weeklies, the Glasgow East News and the Ayrshire Extra.
SHEFFIELD
Redundancy by email
Journalists at Johnston’s Sheffield Star have voted to strike, passed a unanimous vote of no confidence in editor Alan Powell and launched a campaign to fight five compulsory redundancies and an unknown number of voluntary job losses.
The five condemned to go — with more than 100 years’ service between them — are the picture editor, business editor, a senior production manager and reporters in the Barnsley and Rotherham offices, which are to be closed.
The redundancies were announced to staff by email.
A packed chapel meeting voted unanimously to ballot for industrial action. Editorial staff said they were already underpaid, understaffed and overworked.
NUJ mother of chapel Julia Armstrong said: “Feelings are running high. The Star is paying the price for Johnston Press’s spending spree over the last few years and bad decisions taken by JP’s senior management.
“The company relies on the goodwill, loyalty and dedication of its staff who earn meagre salaries well below the national average wage.”
BLACKPOOL
‘One of us worked 110 hours in 11 days’
THE NUJ chapel at Johnston’s Blackpool Gazette has written to mangers to complain about the “systematic destruction” of their newspaper through under-investment. The memo gave examples of people working far in excess of their contracted hours as a result of a recruitment freeze at the paper.
It said: “This fine hard working and historic newspaper now faces the worst crisis in morale and conditions in working memory. A recruitment freeze is redundancy by another name. It drives others out and engenders illegal working practices, in hours worked and rest periods and shift breaks not taken.”
The memo highlights examples, including:
news subs working 55-hour weeks sometimes with unlawfully short breaks between shifts;
a junior reporter who worked 110 hours in just 11 days;
specialist reporters giving at least one extra, unpaid, day of work each week;
the news desk will soon have only one full-time journalist, with reporters being asked to act up to cover the shortfall with no extra pay;
insufficient cover for photographers who are working up to 50 hours a week.
The company disputed the figures but the chapel stands by its information.