Newsquest to make 20-25 more journalists redundant at Glasgow's Herald and Times
Newsquest has announced as many as 25 journalists' jobs will be cut at the Herald and Times newspapers as it makes the fourth round of redundancies at the Glasgow titles in just over a year.
In an attempt to save £1m, publisher Newsquest told staff at the Herald, Sunday Herald, Evening Times and The National that it would cut between 20-25 editorial jobs across the titles.
It marks the fourth time in 14 months that Newsquest has announced job cuts at its Glasgow newspapers having made 20 editorial posts redundant in August. The most recent cuts will leave the staff numbers at the newspapers half of what they were before Newsquest took over, according to the National Union of Journalists.
NUJ Scotland national organiser, Paul Holleran, said "this is not a clever way of running a publishing company and there is a serious risk to future of the newspapers in this stable".
He flagged up a growing concern of a further reduction in quality which he said was now “inevitable as talented journalists lose their jobs and those remaining struggle with an increasing workload to gather and produce news and features that help sell the product”.
Holleran called on Newsquest executives and board members to “take a new look at the way they are running the business,” adding that pursuing “unrealistic profit targets by constantly making cuts instead of innovative growth of the business is not sustainable in the long term”.
He said that the NUJ will “endeavour to work with the new management team, who have inherited this situation, in mitigating the loss of jobs and damage to the titles.
"However we are not prepared to accept blatant compulsory redundancies and there is little doubt the chapel will stand up for that principle.
"I am sure we can put into place maximum consultation to ensure a restructured editorial team which provides support for the workforce while producing decent newspapers but Newsquest need to work flexibly with the union on a number of fronts including acceptable redundancy terms for those at risk."
Newsquest’s last annual financial filing- published in October 2015- reported £70m in profits as it increased its adjusted earnings by 2.7 per cent.