Placards were amateur
ISN’T IT about time that the NUJ provided printed placards for its members on picket lines?
I have every respect and sympathy for the strikers at the Milton Keynes Citizen, as a fellow Johnston Press employee. But their case with the town’s residents could not have been helped by the placards pictured in the March edition.
The union needs to be as professional as possible in its dealings with the general public. Handwritten placards in spidery writing let everyone down. I doubt if many motorists driving past the strikers could even read the message on the boards.
We must know, as journalists, that the presentation of our stories is becoming increasingly important in this visual age.
Surely, the NUJ even its present cash crunch state, can arrange for professionally printed placards to be made available to its next group of strikers? They will enable the members’ message to be prominently displayed and easily read.