Monthly Archives: July 2017

Any funding for newspapers must go to journalism, not executive bonuses

Posted on by

Source: https://cwacanada.ca/

OTTAWA  – CWA Canada, the country’s only all-media union, is calling on the federal government to ensure that any subsidies for newspapers go to creating journalism jobs, not to executive bonuses or hedge fund lenders.

Today, News Media Canada, which represents the country’s print media industry, released a proposal calling for the creation of a government-financed Canadian Journalism Fund. It recommends a subsidy of 35 cents to newspapers and digital media companies for every dollar spent on journalism.

CWA Canada supports aid for the news media industry but cautions that there must be a mechanism to ensure that any subsidy creates jobs and improves journalism.

“Under the current proposal, there is nothing to stop companies like Postmedia from taking millions of dollars in taxpayer money and not creating a single job,” CWA Canada President Martin O’Hanlon said.

“We must ensure that any government subsidies go toward creating front-line journalism jobs and increasing quality civic journalism. They must not be used for executive bonuses, to feed hedge fund lenders, or to outsource jobs overseas.”

Postmedia, which has cut over 3,000 jobs in the last decade, paid CEO Paul Godfrey and other top executives $2.3 million in “retention” bonuses last year.

“Postmedia has been hurt by its self-created debt and hedge fund ownership as much as by declining print ad revenues and should not get taxpayer money unless it spends that money on journalism,” O’Hanlon said.

CWA Canada represents about 6,000 media workers at companies across the country, including the CBC, The Canadian Press, VICE Canada, Thomson Reuters, and many Postmedia publications.

For more information, contact:
Martin O’Hanlon
President, CWA Canada
(613) 867-5090
mohanlon@cwa-scacanada.ca

Media unions, allies welcome CBC governance reform

Posted on by

Source:https://cwacanada.ca/

Many years of advocating for a CBC board of directors that’s free of partisan political appointments has paid off for CWA Canada’s largest Local, the Canadian Media Guild (CMG) and its allies.

Heritage Minister Mélanie Joly announced today the creation of an independent advisory committee, whose members are experts drawn from the media industry, to provide a list of qualified candidates the government can consider to fill vacant positions.

The CMG, which represents most English-language staff at the public broadcaster, commended Prime Minister Justin Trudeau for keeping his election promise to ensure that the board and president will be chosen independently.

Friends of Canadian Broadcasting have run numerous campaigns aimed at preserving the CBC, increasing its funding and getting politics out of its governance. Friends has occasionally joined forces with the CMG and other unions or advocacy groups to bring about changes at the CBC.

CMG noted in a statement that it has “also called for a board that includes employee representatives chosen by CBC’s unions. Ensuring employee representation on boards is a practice that has proven invaluable in other sectors and other countries.

“As journalists and media workers, we have a good sense of what is required to do our jobs well. We know that unrelenting layoffs, smaller newsrooms, and diminished resources have taken their toll. Inevitably, the cuts have an impact not only on our working conditions, but also on what we can offer our audiences. Still, we bring our passion and skill to work and we get the job done. That commitment is also reflected in the work that we do every day in communities all across Canada and around the world.”

During the 2015 federal election, the CMG ran its Champion Public Broadcasting campaign in which it made five proposals and urged their adoption by the national political parties.

NewsGuild-CWA Condemns Arrest of WV Reporter

Posted on by

This is my job. This is what I’m supposed to do.’

Source http://www.newsguild.org/

Updated May 19, 2017  to include letters of protest.

May 10, 2017 – “The NewsGuild-CWA condemns the arrest of radio reporter Dan Heyman on May 9, 2017,” said President Bernie Lunzer. “This is a chilling attack on the right to report. Every journalist across the country should take notice.”

The arrest is part of a pattern of escalating attacks on the media since the Trump administration took office, Lunzer said, which the union is determined to fight.

“In situations like this, the NewsGuild-CWA stands ready to assist,” he said. The organization is sending letters of protest to the West Virginia Gov. Jim Justice, the West Virginia Capitol Police and the Secret Service, Lunzer said, and is joining with the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press and and other news media associations in a letter to the West Virginia Capitol Police.

Heyman’s crime? The reporter for Public News Service persisted in asking Health & Human Services Secretary Tom Price about the Republican health care bill as Price walked through the West Virginia capitol. Price and Kellyanne Conway, Special Counsel to President Trump, were in Charleston to meet with local and state officials and representatives of addiction treatment groups about the opioid crisis in the state, according to the Associated Press.

Watch the video of Heyman’s news conference after his release.

Heyman repeatedly asked Price whether domestic violence would be considered a pre-existing condition under the health care bill, which passed the House on May 4. “In some cases, before the Affordable Care Act, it was a pre-existing condition,” he said, and women who suffered domestic violence were denied coverage.

“This is my job. This is what I’m supposed to do,” Heyman said immediately after his release on $5,000 bail. “I’m supposed to find out if someone is going to be affected by this healthcare law… I think it’s a question that deserves to be answered. I think it’s my job to ask questions and I think it’s my job to try to get answers.”

Heyman said he was recording audio on his phone, which he reached out toward Price, past his staffers, as he walked down the hall. He asked Price the question repeatedly but Price did not answer.

Heyman said he told police officers he was a reporter at the time of the arrest. He was wearing his press credentials over a shirt bearing the Public News Service’s insignia.

He said he thought state police decided he was being “too persistent” in trying to do his job. Heyman was charged with “willful disruption of state government processes.” But he says, “no one who identified themselves as a peace office of any kind – until I was arrested – told me I should not be where I was,” Heyman told reporters.

The West Virginia ACLU and numerous other organizations immediately denounced the arrest. “Today was a dark day for democracy,” the ACLU of West Virginia said. “But the rule of law will prevail. The First Amendment will prevail.”

“This is a highly unusual case,” Heyman’s attorney, Tim DiPiero, said. “I’ve never had a client get arrested for talking too loud or anything similar to that.”

Heyman has been a reporter for about 30 years, with his work appearing in the New York Times, NPR and other national news outlets, he said. He has worked for Public News Service, which provides content to media outlets and publishes its own stories, since 2009.

#Right2Report
#PressFreedom