Globe and Mail staffers received some unfortunate news at a midday town hall Wednesday, where publisher Phillip Crawley told attendees that the newspaper is cutting costs by cutting staff.
“The company wants to reduce the portion of its operating budget dedicated to labour costs by $10-million annually,” Mason Wright, the chairperson for the Globe unit of Unifor 87-M, told Canadaland in a Twitter message. “They are offering a ‘voluntary separation package,’ and if they don’t hit the $10-million target with voluntary departures, they’ll turn to involuntary dismissals to make up the difference.”
Wright told Canadaland that employees from all departments, unionized and non-unionized, will be eligible for a voluntary buyout. In a memo to union members (embedded below), Wright wrote that union leadership asked the company for “more generous voluntary separation terms in an effort to minimize the impact on the workforce, but that suggestion was rejected.”
The deadline to apply for a voluntary buyout is May 29.
The Globe offered voluntary buyouts to employees in 2016, aiming to cut 40 employees.
Wright said the paper currently has “about 635” employees.
Image: The Globe And Mail‘s headquarters in Toronto, from firstgulf.com
Updated at 7:56 a.m. EDT on May 9, 2019, to include the union memo in full.
