National Union of Journalists’ members at two newspaper centres in Yorkshire are to vote on possible industrial action.

Members at the Scarborough Evening News, Sheffield daily The Star and associated titles have informed management that ballot papers will be going out to members on Thursday, with a deadline of 8 April for their return.

In Sheffield, 63 voting papers will be distributed and 24 in Scarborough, asking members whether they wish to hold full industrial action, or action short of striking such as only working contracted hours, in a dispute over proposed new working practices.

The titles’ parent company Johnston Press is in the process of introducing a new Atex content management system which will see reporters writing copy and headlines directly onto template pages.

Earlier this month we reported that JP planned to centralise its production operations for its Yorkshire Regional Newspapers subsidiary in Sheffield, with the Evening News, Whitby Gazette and Bridlington Free Press among the titles affected.

This latest announcement comes just a day after Johnston Press journalists at the Blackpool Gazette and Herald announced they would be holding strike action on Monday.

NUJ members in Lancashire have chosen to remove goodwill by working only contracted hours and holding a mandatory chapel meeting.

NUJ northern organiser Chris Morley said: “A lot will depend on the company. The experience that we’ve had so far is that the rollout of the Atex has been a shambles.

“There’s insufficient training and resources given to it and they’re having to work a massive increase in hours and unpaid overtime.

“It’s been enormously stressful with stories disappearing on deadline and members are up in arms about it.”

Johnston Press declined to comment.

Comments

JP Worker (19/03/2010 15:24:49)
As I understand it they’ve told the subs in Scarborough that if they want to keep their jobs they need to move to Sheffield. It all points again to the fact that JP is run by a bunch of clueless idiots. They’re glorified beancounters who aren’t fit or skilled enough to run a business (hence the reason they ran around buying up newspapers that were losing money just before the credit crunch hit). They have no grasp of what newspaper readers actually want and so see fit to save money by destroying the products that journalists have worked hard on to sell to the public. Atex is simply a way of culling subs but removes all the checks and balances that prevent newspapers from putting stories that are legally dodgy, full of poor spelling and grammar and presented with no care. Then JP has this ratios nonsense whereby the papers have to be 60% advertising and 40% editorial. As the advertising departments I’ve come across are mostly useless, it’ll come as no surprise that the company is short-changing the readers with less editorial space and therefore either less stories or poor crammed design as a result. Portsmouth FC’s bosses have better financial nouse than JP.

DunSubbin (22/03/2010 09:48:01)
If JP management had any decency they would sell off the business, which they clearly cannot run, to people who can. The only way now to save some titles is to revert to the old model, and have independents publishing newspapers.

Jane (22/03/2010 11:11:44)
Do you think Northcliffe and Trinity Mirror are any better? If so, you are misguided. The ratios exist as advertising is where the money comes from so obviously it needs to play a part in how many pages are printed in order to make a profit.
Please don’t get me wrong, I was made redundant in September from my features editor job as I did writing and subbing. My whole team went.
As for advertising, I gather my old paper’s ad team had a “Sales Day” on Friday – should that not be everyday? Perhaps editorial could have a “Writing Day”!? – ridiculous!

JP Worker (22/03/2010 11:57:58)
Good on them. Stick it to the jumped-up ad reps turned middle managers who have doggedly tried to flog a dead horse. Let’s repeat – the system is a shambles. Far from being an “exciting opportunity” for journalists, it’s simply a cost-cutting device to get rid of subs and squeeze more life out of over-worked, over-stressed, under-valued reporters who are not equipped for it. And guess what? Readers notice the poor quality of the product being sold. And guess what? That will, make no mistake, affect the shareholders. Great decisions, common sense, jumped-up little ad reps – welcome to Johnston Press.

Adman (22/03/2010 16:23:01)
Jane – If you don’t like the idea of ‘Sales days’ and incentives in a SALES office, then maybe you could offer us an insight into how to motivate sales people, when most companies at the moment are cutting their ad spend? Please do tell…..