01 March 2005

Layoffs, redundancies, bargaining gambits make for troubling times at CBC

Canadian Media Guild | TNG Canada Local 30213

It's been a troubling few weeks at the CBC, where the Canadian Media Guild represents several thousand employees.

Chris Cuthbert

On Monday, the public broadcaster notified 18 people in Toronto, St. John's, Winnipeg and Edmonton that their positions will become redundant. Last week, 20 people in Vancouver were told their jobs are gone and, if they wish to remain employed, they should apply for virtually identical replacement positions. Add to that the termination of sports host Chris Cuthbert.

The redundancy notices to 10 permanent staff members at the Toronto Production Centre came on top of seven voluntary layoff packages negotiated with staff there earlier in February.

According to CBC management, the bulk of the job losses are the result of cuts in radio and television budgets.

"This is very disheartening,” says Arnold Amber, President of the CBC Branch of the Canadian Media Guild (CMG) and Director of TNG Canada/CWA. “There seems to be a growing tendency toward layoffs at the CBC this year, with about 50 announced in the last few weeks alone. The question is, when will it stop? We are challenging the CBC to find other ways out of its presumed financial difficulties.”

Amber is also a member of the CMG bargaining team that sees these actions as confirmation of their concerns about the CBC's desire for a disposable, contract workforce and its disregard for the collective agreement. The CMG says it's an aggressive approach by a corporation bent on absolute control.

Last week, that tone was reflected at the bargaining table, where no progress was made.

CBC management, reports the team, is now intent on changing the Performance Management/Staff Development (PMSD) system from a progressive process to a quasi-disciplinary one.

PMSD was jointly developed eight years ago by the unions and the CBC. It was designed to ensure that employees have an opportunity through an open and positive process to develop their careers and to share in the objectives of the corporation. Now the CBC wants to link any failure to meet objectives to a process that may ultimately lead to an employee’s termination.

Currently, there is a separate review process in the collective agreement to deal with performance problems. It’s designed to be a corrective and supportive process, not a punitive one. It gives an employee up to nine months to make any corrections necessary and provides for training, mentoring, etc. to ensure the employee has every opportunity to succeed. It’s a process that does not stay on an employee’s file. And in the event that the employee is unable to meet the expectations of the job, there are provisions for reassignment or layoff with the possibility of recall.

What the CBC now proposes is a type of review process that would shorten the time to meet the job standards to six months and would keep a record on an employee’s file for two years, even if the problem is fixed early on. If the standards aren’t met, an employee could face losing his or her job with no right of recall.

The CBC also wishes to link this process to Performance Management.

The CMG bargaining team says it is very troubled by this turn of events. In its original goals and objectives, the corporation indicated it was seeking a “fair and simple” review process. The Guild took significant steps to meet the corporation’s interests in a way that would benefit everyone. The CBC responded by refusing the CMG's proposals and then increased its own demands.

It’s now an issue of trust. The existing collective agreements require a Guild member's participation in PMSD. But until this issue is resolved, the future of the process is in doubt.

The Guild is back at the table the weeks of March 7th and 28th and has scheduled seven weeks of bargaining through April and May.

(This is an edited combination of two stories that recently appeared on the Canadian Media Guild web site.)