The Guild was notified this morning that Shaw Media management is cutting jobs across the country, including six positions in our bargaining unit. Although management mentioned concerns across the industry about new media habits and the loss of advertising revenue in conventional TV, the Guild bargaining committee was not given any specific warnings about potential layoffs in recent meetings. We are troubled by the layoffs and note that Shaw Communications is a profitable company that increased dividends to shareholders by 8% as recently as this January.

If you receive a notice of layoff from management, please get in touch with a member of the Guild executive at Shaw or Terri Monture (terri@cmg.ca) at the Guild’s national office to make sure your rights under the Collective Agreement are respected. Employees who are being laid off can opt to go on a 12-month list to be recalled, according to seniority, to any vacant position for which they can immediately do the work. If the 12 months pass without an opportunity for recall, the employee will receive severance pay at that time. Employees with a layoff notice can opt to receive severance immediately upon layoff instead of being added to the recall list. To find out more about your rights, see article 23 of the collective agreement.

Your Guild bargaining team is scheduled to meet the company next week. We will continue to focus on negotiating a fair deal that recognizes the value of the work you do. We will also ask how the company intends on dealing with any workload pressure that arises from the job cuts.

Your Guild executive:

David Baker
Brent Tennant
Terri Monture, Staff Representative