CBC Lockout in Second Month; Talks Continue, Support Concert Planned
Source : Broadcaster Magazine
September 16, 2005
An evening in support of public broadcasting will be held as the nation's public broadcaster enters its second month of employee lockout.
The Friends of Canadian Broadcasting is one of the sponsors of the event, scheduled for Wednesday, September 21st, at Massey Hall in Toronto. Should a settlement be reached before then, the event will be cancelled.
Nearly 5,500 on-air journalists, reporters, technicians and support staff - members of the Canadian Media Guild - have been locked out of the CBC since August 15.
In the meantime, several locked out employee have found alternative broadcast outlets, such as the morning news and information program being distributed via CIUT-FM radio, the Internet and pod cast devices.
On-air at the CBC and CBC Newsworld, however, the on-air reporters now filling in are not locked-out members of the Canadian Media Guild. Most are in Quebec, where the journalists belong to a different union than CMG. There is also a reporter and videographers in Moncton who belong to the Quebec union. In addition, several reporters stationed overseas have done stories or could soon be asked to do so. Ann MacMillan, a former correspondent, is the manager in London. Nancy Durham and Azeb Wolde-Giorgis in London, Nahlah Ayed in the Middle East, David McGuffin in Africa, and Henry Champ in Washington are all on unaffiliated contracts. These people are local hires and as such have not been locked out. However, out of solidarity with his colleagues, Paul Workman in Paris has decided not to return to work until the lockout is over. As a result, CBC management has put him on "unauthorized" leave.
Discussions between CBC management and the CMG about the terms, conditions, content and context of a new bargaining agreement continue in what is called 'a critical phase."
The CBC reports that discussions on the outstanding issues continued without additional language being signed off. The talks are to continue today, the CBC said.
"We spent a considerable amount of time discussing contracting out and will continue these discussions on Friday."
The CMG reports that as negotiations ended late last night the two sides were attempting to reach agreement on one of the key items – the rules, limitations and processes for any plans by the CBC to contract out work being done by Guild members.
Also still to be settled are five other major issues, it said: employment status, layoff, freelance workers, job evaluation and many money matters. Extensive discussions have already been held on layoff and recall, freelancers and job evaluation. However, talks about money have been brief and employment status has not been discussed at all.
"In addition to those items, we have some work to do on a handful of important but less contentious items," said Arnold Amber, president of the CBC branch and a member of the CMG negotiating team.
The CBC says that some progress had been made, including a sign off on issues relating to Foreign Correspondents. A significant amount of time was spent discussing and exchanging language on Contracting Out, the CBC reported, with negotiations continuing today.
Meanwhile, the Guild says lawyers for CBC management sent a letter threatening disciplinary action and a grievance against the union representing CBC/Radio-Canada reporters in Quebec and Moncton. The union, SCRC, passed a resolution this weekend asking its members to refuse to do work that would normally be done by locked-out members of the Guild. During the 30-day lockout, CBC/SRC members in Quebec and Moncton have been assigned to work in the Guild's jurisdiction. In many cases, our colleagues have refused the assignments. In other cases, they have respected our picket lines. Now, they are being threatened with discipline if they refuse to help support the management-imposed lockout.
The benefit concert planned in support of public broadcast will feature a number of well-known Canadian entertainment personalities, including some known for their work at or on CBC, including the comedy team Air Farce, writer/journalist June Callwood, political figure Joe Clark, musical group Moxy Fruvous, writer Alice Munro, scientist and Nobel Laureate John Polyani.
The event is sponsored by several groups and industry associations, including ACTRA, the ACTRA Fraternal Benefit Society, the American Federation of Musicians, the Friends of Canadian Broadcasting, Canadian Actors Equity, the Writer's Guild of Canada and many more.
