The National Union of Journalists has claimed that Johnston Press is offering its “underpaid” journalists free games of bingo to supplement their wages, but there’s no chance of landing the jackpot – they’ve also been barred from winning the top prizes.

Staff have been told they can play 40 free games on Johnston’s online bingo service, ten more than the 30 free games offered to the group’s newspaper readers. The newspaper publisher has made 230 editorial staff redundant in the past 12 months alone, and only this year lifted the freeze on salaries which lasted for two years.

NUJ negotiator Jenny Lennox was on hand with a suitable quip: “It seems that the real lottery for journalists is whether or not they will still have a job in a year’s time,” she said.

“We are entering a whole new never-never land when we find that the company is now resorting to bingo to keep afloat – and pay massive management salaries – while cuts to its journalistic service to local communities are driving away readers, advertisers and revenue.”

She added that the “once-proud” publisher is being “run into the ground” and that “it will take a lot more than bingo to restore [its] reputation”. The NUJ as an organisation “demands that Johnston management begins to work with its skilled and dedicated journalists to rebuild a stable of newspapers of which readers, staff and the group can be proud”.

(Source: NUJ)

Photo taken by Flickr user cote, licensed under Creative Commons.

No related posts.