Reform needed at the Guardian

TOM DAVIES updated the February Branch meeting on events at the Guardian and Observer: “we had an enormously inspiring four days of strike action in December” opposing the plan by the Scott Trust, owner of the Guardian, to hive the Observer off to Tortoise Media. “We found at the end of our second day on strike that the deal had been signed and was was, we were told, legally watertight. We did have two more days on strike.” He also reported a worrying development in computer-assisted strike-breaking.

Since the strike the journalists' negotiating team had won “mitigations” on the deal. The company had approved redundancy terms for those staff who may not want to go over from the Observer to Tortoise – which it didn't have to do under the law on Transfer of Undertakings (Protection of Employment) (known as TUPE).

On the Tuesday and Wednesday after our meeting the chapel had talks scheduled about TUPE - so Tom needed “to be vague". The talks were due to include terms for casuals and freelances “where we can," because Tortoise “has been very vague” about its plans for Observer freelances so far. The NUJ organisation in a newspaper office is called a “chapel”.

Tortoise has said that it will honour existing freelance contracts until March 2026. The situation has led to “a lot of stress” for freelances.

“For those of us who will be left at the Guardian,” Tom reported, “the whole process of hiving off the Observer has exposed the Scott Trust. Contrary to its high-minded public profile it has had a quite contemptuous attitude to its journalists - and to its readers as well.”

The chapel is “seeking reform of the Scott Trust”. At present there is just one journalist on the Trust board. The chapel is developing a public-facing campaign for “mutualisation” - converting the Trust into something roughly resembling a co-operative, with reader representatives on the board.

Enter robo-scab

“One alarming thing that happened during the strike, that we discovered after it,” Tom reported, “was that the skeleton website and paper the company put out was done with the assistance of an 'AI' tool, Headline Helper.” Strike breakers are traditionally denounced as “scabs”: this may herald the arrival of the robo-scab. “This was contrary to a previous agreement,” Tom said, “that any rollout of AI would be in consultation with staff and readers. That's alarming for the industry as a whole.”

At a time when money is being spent on the Telegraph and Spectator, the Observer being hived off to a loss-making outfit is... not good news for the media ecosystem as a whole.”

Questions

A member asked about the position of Black journalists and recounted woes trying to pitch to the papers. Tom noted that “there is a bursary scheme, that is improving things from a very low base” and invited members to get in touch if they have had stuff ripped off.

Another member asked about the status of Tortoise – is it a Trust too? Tom reported that the Scott Trust is now a private company – not a “trust” in law. “There was a tweak in its articles of Association [constitution, in effect] about a decade ago - and we are now reaping the results of that.” Tortoise is a “private limited company”. “Its founder, James Harding, has a journalism background” including being Director of BBC News from 2013 to 2018 - “but the company as a whole does not”.

© Mike Holderness