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Home | Thursday 18th November 2010 | Issue 748

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CITY SUBS PICKET SHAME

At SchNEWS we are accustomed to cranking out the news every week with the ever present spectre of financial ruin breathing down our necks. For our comrades in the mainstream media, however, it seems like a state of affairs they’re not quite as comfortable with.

Whilst the Paxman-flummoxing BBC strikes over plans to chainsaw staff pensions grabbed all the headlines (at least the ones written by scab labour), local news-hounds around the country have also been taking action over mass redundancies and plans to put the squeeze on those that remain.

In Brighton, staff at local rag the Argus launched a feeble attempt to challenge SchNEWS’ position as the most radical purveyors of news in the Brighton and Hove area.

Yesterday (18th) saw the first day of a 48-hour strike over plans to sack the entire subs desk and ship operations to Southampton. Whilst we have no love for the team that brought us such classic Smash EDO-based headlines as “SHAMEFUL”, the move is another blow to the concept of a local newspaper. As SchNEWS went to print the Argus had yet to mention the strike in its own pages.

The Argus is owned by Newsquest – the mini-me local version of Murdoch’s evil national empire. Itself owned by the US’s largest publisher, Newsquest owns 17 Dailies and over 200 weeklies - and titles across the country are set to be hit by the latest round of cutbacks. They have already announced plans for mass-sackings at the Bradford Telegraph & Argus, Ilkley Gazette, Wharfedale & Airedale Observer and the Keighley News. The journalists then have the option of scrabbling for a reduced number of replacement jobs on far worse terms and conditions.

Earlier in the month, 75% of the editorial staff at the Southampton Daily Echo staged a 48-hour walkout after a pay freeze since June 2008, the closure of the final salary pension scheme and the scrapping of loyalty payments.

Whether it affects the quality of the drivel many local rags churn out remains to be seen - SchNEWS has been produced by scab labour and agency temps since the editorial staff went on strike in 1996 and no one has ever noticed.

Keywords: austerity, journalism, media, workers struggles


 
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A brief history of the Dragon Festival and Cigarrones travellers site, southern Spain.
The Cigarrones travellers’ site is one of several communities which have sprung up near Orgiva in Andalucía, Spain, in recent decades. Coming to the southern tip of Europe to escape the repression against travellers in Britain and elsewhere, they have carved out a life of avin’ it autonomous anarchy – despite increasing attention from tinpot local authorities who act like Franco is still in. Since 1997 the site has held the annual Dragon Festival - now arguably one of the most significant free festivals in Europe – but this is also under attack. Here is a brief history written by a resident of Cigarrones:
SchNEWS interviews Canadian journalist and military historian Gwynne Dyer about the dire warnings for a post-climate change world in his book 'The Climate Wars'
Report from US-Mexico border about the narco wars whose connections go right up to the president
One year after the military coup in Honduras which ousted the leader and installed a neo-liberal cabal, grassroots groups across the country are aligning to create a popular movement.
SchNEWS interviews Richard Stallman – hacker, founder of the Free Software movement and activist for digital-software-information freedom...
From Kemp Town to Kabul, as SchNEWS interviews Al Jazeera journalist Medyan Dairieh about his take on the war...
An eyewitness account from Phnom Penh, as Cambodia faces its largest forced displacements since the time of the Khmer Rouge.
The future of Titnore Woods is threatened as Tesco and Worthing Council gang up to build upon the ancient woodland...
Who are the far-right English Defence League, and what are their strategies?
With the murder of Russian human rights activist Natalia Estemirova in Chechnya, we look at the Russian-backed despotic regime in Chechnya.
At the last minute the Big Green Gathering festival in Somerset was pulled due to legal pressure - SchNEWS looks at the events and factors that led to this.
The president of Honduras, Manuel Zelaya, is removed and sent into exile after a military coup d'etat.
This year marks the 24th anniversary of the infamous police attack on travellers on their way to Stonehenge in an incident now known as the Battle Of The Beanfield.
SchNEWS looks how deep the financial problems are for the banks and the British Govt, and how they won't learn from their errors.
Given a more optimistic environment after Obama's announcement that he's going to close the Guantanamo prison camp, SchNEWS interviews ex-detainee, Omar Deghayes, to gauge his reaction.
Eyewitness accounts from British activists on the ground during the wanton attack on Gaza by Israel in January 2009.
Somali pirates roaming the Gulf Of Aden, hijacking - amongst other ships - a Saudi oil supertanker. How is it possible? What geo-political context is giving rise to these latter-day pirates?

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