A THREAT of strike action by members of the National Union of Journalists at the BBC has been lifted.
Says the NUJ website, here: “Strike action threatened at the BBC has been pulled, following negotiations with the unions and director general.”
The union quotes its general secretary, Michelle Stanistreet, as saying: “We’re pleased that common sense has prevailed and that a sensible solution has been negotiated following talks with Tony Hall.
“NUJ members are deeply concerned that the proposed job cuts will have a devastating impact on their ability to produce quality content. That NUJ members were prepared to take strike action is a measure of that concern, and a reflection of how low morale at the corporation has fallen.
“That the management within News now have to come up with their plan as to how posts can be lost without burdening already over-stretched journalists is a sensible step forward.
“A moratorium on compulsory redundancies and a proper process to deal with assessments of workloads is good news for NUJ members, and good news for the viewing public.”
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MEANWHILE, the NUJ in Scotland is seeking to gauge the level of interest for several media course options it is considering providing.
Says NUJ Scotland’s training manager, Joan Macdonald: “As part of our overall training portfolio, we are planning to offer some short courses which will cost £45 for NUJ members and £60 for non-members. These courses will be three hours long and run either from 9.30am-1.30pm or 2pm-5pm. In order to gauge demand, can you let me know if any of these would be of interest.”
The options are: Media law for bloggers, Social Media Law, Sound recording, Lighting, Avid editing, Health and Safety, and Internet security.
To find out more, visit www.nujtrainingscotland.com or contact Joan Macdonald on 0141 248 6648/7748 or 07730 513991 or via joanm@nuj.org.uk
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BEGINS the best part of a two-page spread in today’s Scotsman (pages ten and 11): “Media from all over the world have descended on Scotland – all with their own reasons for intently watching the independence debate.”
Read more, here.
And The Herald’s Robbie Dinwoodie also reports the arrival of the world’s media, here.
He begins his report, thus: “The world’s media arrived in Scotland to be treated to a case study in the Caledonian Antisyzygy.
“There you go. I never thought I’d get that phrase into a news report. But there it is.”
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REPORTS The Drum media and marketing magazine: “[First Minister] Alex Salmond has declared war on the BBC after the broadcaster reported on sensitive information he alleges was leaked from the UK government informing it that the Royal Bank of Scotland would relocate its headquarters to England in the case of a referendum yes vote.”
Read more, here.
And the story is also reported, here, by pressgazette.co.uk, which begins its report: “Alex Salmond has said there would be an ‘inevitable investigation; over allegations that the Treasury leaked ‘market-sensitive’ information about Royal Bank of Scotland’s proposal to register itself in England if Scotland votes for independence.”
Read more, here.
The story is also picked up by, among others, The Independent (here) and The Guardian (here).
View Salmond making his remarks, here.
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A SCOTS photography collective – seeking to capture images of Scotland in 2014 – has produced an 84-page book, to coincide with an exhibition of its work, being held in Glasgow.
Document Scotland comprises Sophie Gerrard, Jeremy Sutton-Hibbert, Colin McPherson and Stephen McLaren. And its book, Common Ground, can be purchased here, for £10 plus P&P.
The exhibition is taking place at Street Level Photoworks, until the 19th of next month.
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AT the time of writing, 1,199 people have signed an online petition, headed, ‘Put Scotland in control of Scottish Broadcasting.’
Take a look, here.
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BEGINS The Guardian, here: “The BBC is under political pressure to reveal details of a highly-charged internal study which found that viewers in an independent Scotland would have to pay almost double their current licence fee if they wanted to continue watching and listening to the same BBC shows.”
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HOW might the media report a Yes vote in the upcoming referendum on Scots independence. The website, Buzzfeed, boldly claims the following, here, will ‘definitely happen’.
Definitely worth a look…
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BEGINS The Guardian: “Scotland voting for independence would be disastrous for the UK’s £15bn a year advertising market, according to the heads of leading agencies including Bartle Bogle Hegarty and M&C Saatchi.”
Read more, here.
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