Bell cutting 1,300 positions, shuttering six radio stations
TORONTO –
BCE Inc. is reducing 1,300 positions, round three per cent of its workforce, and shutting or promoting 9 radio stations as the corporate plans to “significantly adapt” the way it delivers the news.
The firm says the job cuts are in response to unfavourable public coverage and regulatory situations that it could actually now not outwait.
The plan entails “moving to a single newsroom approach across brands, allowing for greater collaboration and efficiency,” mentioned Richard Gray, vice-president of news at Bell Media, in an inside memo distributed to employees Wednesday morning and supplied to The Canadian Press.
In an interview with The Canadian Press, Bell govt vice-president and chief authorized and regulatory officer Robert Malcolmson mentioned the corporate’s media department “can’t afford” to proceed working with its varied manufacturers — similar to CTV National News, BNN, CP24, its native TV news stations and radio channels — working independently of each other.
The eradicated positions embrace a six per cent reduce at Bell Media, which is a part of BCE Inc.’s Bell Canada division. Bell Media’s holdings embrace the CTV tv community, specialty TV channels, radio stations and manufacturing studios.
“It’s a consolidation of news gathering, news delivery,” Malcolmson mentioned.
“We are combining the news production function in a horizontal way so that you have one common platform that is serving news to the relevant outlet from one management team.”
Employees had been additionally knowledgeable that Winnipeg’s Funny 1290, Calgary’s Funny 1060, Edmonton’s TSN 1260 Radio, Vancouver’s BNN Bloomberg Radio 1410 and Funny 1040, together with London’s NewsSpeak 1290 would shutter.
Bell Media can be promoting Hamilton’s AM Radio 1150 and AM 820, in addition to Windsor’s AM 580, to an undisclosed third occasion, topic to CRTC approval.
Management positions are being slashed by six per cent, in line with the corporate. There may even be 20 per cent fewer govt roles within the firm in contrast with 2020.
In a separate inside memo despatched on Wednesday, Bell Media president Wade Oosterman mentioned employees affected by cuts would learn this week. Around 30 per cent of the positions being eradicated are present vacancies that will not be crammed.
He instructed workers the corporate is dealing with “the ongoing migration of advertising revenue to foreign digital platforms” similar to Facebook and Google, and a shift from cable, satellite tv for pc and Fibre TV subscribers to digital streaming platforms.
“We are also faced with strong economic and inflationary pressures, a pullback in advertisers’ budgets, and a challenging regulatory environment that has been too slow to adjust,” mentioned Oosterman in his memo to employees.
MEDIA HEADWINDS
In an open letter printed on-line Wednesday, Bell Canada president and CEO Mirko Bibic mentioned Bell Canada expects to lose greater than $250 million in legacy telephone revenues per 12 months, whereas its news operations incur $40 million in annual working losses. He mentioned Bell radio stations have seen revenue reduce in half for the reason that begin of the COVID-19 pandemic.
“The job reductions are consistent with but smaller than similar reductions announced by other leading technology and media companies across North America in recent months,” mentioned Bibic.
In 2021, Bell Media laid off 210 workers within the Toronto space.
In the U.S., the media trade has introduced greater than 17,000 cuts to this point this 12 months, the very best year-to-date on file, in line with the May 2023 Challenger Report, which tracks layoffs. The second-highest year-to-date for the sector occurred in 2020, when 16,750 cuts had been introduced by means of May.
As a part of Bell’s shift to a extra streamlined newsroom throughout its manufacturers, Gray mentioned CTV National News govt producer Rosa Hwang is now not with the corporate, efficient instantly.
David Hughes, Ramneek Gill, Sophia Skopelitis and Jonathan Kay will tackle expanded roles inside the news division as the corporate strikes from a “vertical” to “horizontal” administration construction.
CTV’s overseas bureaus in London, U.Ok, and Los Angeles are set to shut, with all positions primarily based in these areas eradicated, whereas its Washington bureau “will be scaled back to focus more fully on important news from the USA and the impacts on Canada,” mentioned Gray.
Meanwhile, CTV’s National News crew is including videographers to 4 new provinces, together with instantly in St. John’s, N.L. and Regina, Sask., with others to return later this 12 months in Fredericton, N.B. and Charlottetown, PEI.
POLICY CONCERNS
Malcolmson mentioned regulatory challenges affecting each the telecommunications facet and media arm merely left the corporate in an “unenviable place,” with no selection however to make widespread cuts.
“We’re obviously trying to do this in the most humane, least impactful way possible,” he mentioned.
“This thing affects all layers of the company and isn’t targeted at any one band of employees.”
Malcolmson didn’t rule out additional layoffs within the foreseeable future, saying the corporate will take a wait-and-see strategy to the regulatory atmosphere.
He took intention at “relentless regulatory intervention” by the CRTC, below Ottawa’s path, that has prioritized measures to convey down the price of telecommunication providers.
Noting that the price of wi-fi service has declined round 25 per cent and the price of broadband high-speed web has gone up by lower than one per cent over the past three years, regardless of Canada’s general excessive inflation, Malcolmson mentioned “maybe it’s time to declare victory” for Ottawa.
“I think the government’s sort of populist focus on pricing isn’t necessarily in line with current reality and the government has created an intensely competitive industry structure that they should allow to play out,” he mentioned.
Malcolmson additionally lamented the method round two items of laws designed to assist Canada’s struggling media sector. While Bill C-18 would require firms like Google and Meta to pay Canadian shops for news content material that seem on their platforms, he mentioned it may very well be for naught if the businesses observe by means of on threats to easily limit or block news hyperlinks on their websites.
The different, Bill C-11, goals to power platforms similar to Netflix, YouTube and TikTok to contribute a share of their Canadian income to Canadian manufacturing, however Malcolmson mentioned it isn’t going to unravel the “fundamental problem” that widespread American content material is being “withheld” by main streaming platforms from showing on Canadian TV.
Malcolmson mentioned Bell has been ready for regulatory reform for years and the corporate determined to not maintain again cuts pending the result of regulatory consultations on these payments any additional.
“The time for waiting for reform is over. Those reforms may never come so we have a responsibility to our shareholders and to our employees to make sure the business can be positioned for future growth and that means we have to make our cost structure make sense,” he mentioned.
“We have to make sure that our business is ready to function in a viable approach, and we will not wait two years and one other, for instance, $80 million of losses in news to see what the federal government may do.
“At some point, we have to say to ourselves, ‘Is it worth funding this?”‘
This report by The Canadian Press was first printed June 14, 2023
CTV News is a division of Bell Media, which is a part of BCE Inc.
