Newspaper & Mailroom

Journal de Montréal Locks Out Employees

Monday 26. January 2009 - Management has responsibility to introduce business model that can secure newspaper's future and preserve its market leadership. Journal will continue publishing despite dispute.

In view of the union’s refusal to recognize the urgency of the situation and the need for far-reaching changes to the Journal de Montreal’s business model, and in order to prevent pressure tactics from disrupting the newspaper’s publication, management has decided to exercise its rights under the Labour Code and today declared a lock-out of some 250 editorial and office employees covered by the STIJM (Syndicat des travailleurs de l’information du Journal de Montreal (CSN)) bargaining certificate. The Journal will continue publishing despite the dispute.

“Not only did the union give management an ultimatum based on a position that has not budged since January 15, but it seems increasingly clear that the union’s strategy is to deadlock the bargaining talks,” said Lyne Robitaille, publisher of the Journal de Montreal.

The union is attempting to lay the blame for the dispute on the employer but in fact it has left the company no choice. Journal de Montreal management did not want a labour dispute and would prefer to focus all efforts on addressing the challenges of the new media environment. However, the union’s intransigence and unwillingness to accept the fundamental changes that have affected print media in the West in recent years made the conflict unavoidable. Nevertheless, management hopes the situation will lead the employees’ representatives to take a more realistic view of the issues facing the organization.

Quebec is not immune

The new collective agreement will guide the Journal de Montreal’s operations in the years ahead and will be decisive for the paper’s future. Quebec is not immune to the turmoil in the paid-circulation newspaper industry, caused by factors such as the advent of Internet news sites and other free news sources, changing readership habits, the distribution of content in digital formats, the availability of regularly updated real-time information, and falling revenues from advertising and classifieds.

To maintain the Journal’s longstanding status as Montreal’s leading newspaper, management is determined to make the shift to digital expeditiously and effectively, as many other major dailies have done. The move will enable the Journal to deliver the local news and exclusive features readers want in the format and medium of their choice: on paper, on the Internet or on a mobile device.

“The new media realities call for major changes in our ways of doing things,” said Ms. Robitaille. “This is why we want to invest in creating a more modern and efficient newsroom equipped to harness multiplatform, multimedia technologies.”

The print version of the Journal will also have to be redesigned to compete with the growing number of free, real-time news sources, such as the Internet, all-news channels and mobile devices, by offering exclusives, investigative reports and local news.

Cutting costs and increasing productivity

In addition to bringing in 21st century tools and working methods, the changes planned by management will cut operating costs, increase operational flexibility and enhance employee productivity, three prerequisites for improving the newspaper’s profitability, which has been in decline for several years.

As part of the Sun Media Corporation, Canada’s largest newspaper chain, the Journal is positioned to take advantage of synergies that can help reduce operating costs in areas unrelated to editorial content, such as accounting and classified ads. “The Internet has had a considerable impact on classifieds, as is well known,” said Lyne Robitaille. “We need to invest in our main product, which is news, This being said, as it will be impossible to maintain all jobs at the paper, we have already made a commitment to offer employees who will have to leave the Journal generous separation packages accompanied by relocation support.”

“It is also important to bear in mind that if they accept the employer’s offer, the Journal’s employees will continue to enjoy the best conditions and salaries in the media industry,” said Ms. Robitaille.

Extravagant demands

The Journal’s management is surprised that the union refuses to acknowledge that paid-circulation newspapers in Quebec face the same challenges as those in the rest of the world.

“Given that its members enjoy working conditions that are better than those of 98% of Quebec workers, given that all observers, here and elsewhere, agree that newspapers are in a state of crisis, given that the entire world is experiencing an economic crisis and is eager to embrace change, how can a responsible union come to the bargaining table and demand pay raises, a gym, and more union leave? How can the union leadership claim it doesn’t want a labour dispute when they have told anyone who is willing to listen that they can get their members severance pay worth 76% of their salary for two years, tax free?

“The employees and their union point out that they have been the architects of the Journal’s success,” notes Lyne Robitaille. “But that doesn’t give them the right to hold its future hostage.”