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21 April 2005
CBC plan to contract-out publicity
has serious
flaws
Public broadcaster would pay more for less;
English-language TV, radio, internet services would suffer
Canadian
Media Guild | TNG Canada
Local 30213
The CBC’s plan to contract out the
work of publicity for English TV, radio and internet services
is seriously flawed and would end up costing more for fewer
results. This is the message the Guild has sent to the CBC
board of directors, senior managers, politicians and journalists
in a bid to force a sober second look at the proposal.
The CBC’s plan means cutting
34 Guild jobs nation-wide in the Communications department,
hiring at least five extra managers and paying $1 million
to an outside agency for pared-down publicity work. All
of this is supposed to take place by the end of June.
The communications department believes it will save $864,000
per year with the move. The Guild estimates that the person-hours
available to do the work would be reduced by 90 per cent.
That means:
- Only a selected few shows
would get publicity support. It would put an end to the
help other shows now get from CBC publicity staff working
on their own initiative. The programming not targeted by
management for publicity and promotion, including most
of radio, would either do without or spend more of their
own program budgets to get the word out. Obviously, this
would squeeze programming.
- The job cuts would devastate regional
outreach and publicity in places like Ottawa, Calgary and
Winnipeg, where only one person would be left to organize
outreach events and support regional shows in both TV and
radio. Producers are nervous that their own workload would
skyrocket or the profile of their programs would suffer.
- Journalists would cover the
CBC less. This is not only because there would be less
media relations work, but also because many journalists
have made it clear that they prefer to deal with CBC
publicists, who know the history and have excellent inside
contacts, than external publicists.
- Public awareness of CBC programs
would decrease. Public broadcasting would have even
more difficulty competing with the privates and their U.S.
programming and that will make the CBC, reliant on public
support and government funds, even more vulnerable than
it already is.
The CBC did not alert the Guild to its plan until two weeks
ago, long after managers had begun hatching the dubious plan
to try to save money by hiring a national PR firm to promote
CBC shows. Managers could not provide any detailed written
analysis comparing the cost of doing the work in-house versus
contracting it out.
The union asked the CBC to delay signing a deal with an
outside company until the end of May, so that we could work
with existing employees to come up with an alternative and
truly cost-saving plan. Managers refused the Guild's request,
insisting a company must be selected by the first week of
May.
The Guild is urging the CBC to stop
its process to contract out the publicity work and treat
its employees with respect. There are better ways to save
money and refocus publicity work and "attract wider audiences." One
place to start is to examine the increasingly management-heavy
structure of the Communications department itself. Under
the proposed model, there would be one manager for every
two employees!
The Guild introduced language at the bargaining table months
ago proposing a ban on contracting our work to outside firms.
Clearly, there is no agreement on this issue.
There are signs that CBC managers are on the defensive
about their current plan. A number of Guild members facing
job cuts have been threatened with discipline for even
communicating with their colleagues about the issue. There
is no justification for this kind of action on the part
of managers, and it is wrong to add to the stress of a
group of people whose careers the Corporation is putting
on the line.
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