News Corp restructure moves ahead with photographer positions made redundant
News Corp has axed as many as 70 staff photographers from across its mastheads as the company moves to adopt an outsourcing model, according to a report in The Guardian.
According to the report, managers started meeting individual photographers for a “skills assessment” for forced redundancies last week.
The redundancies follow on from a restructure announcement from News Corp – which publishes the likes of The Daily Telegraph, The Australian, the Herald Sun and the Courier Mail – which revealed the publisher was set to slash jobs across its editorial operations in a move which will see most photographers made redundant and a drastic reduction in sub-editing staff.
At the time, Campbell Reid, News Corp’s director of editorial management, said: “These changes are necessary to achieve the balance of resourcing between content creation, content production and digital excellence.”
Mumbrella understands discussions have been happening across all News Corp sites around the country, with a number of photographers understood to have raised their hand for voluntary redundancies.
While The Guardian has reported 13 photographers in Queensland have been forced to take redundancies, with 25 let go in NSW and 10 in South Australia, News Corp declined to comment on specific numbers, saying it was an internal staff matter.
The restructure announcement in April resulted in angry News Corp staffers in Queensland passing a vote of no confidence in their management.
According to the motion passed unanimously at a meeting of editorial staff in Brisbane, they believe that News Corp management in Sydney does not have a vision to rebuild a viable company.
It stated: “Senior News Corp management needs to be held accountable for its poor business decisions, lack of vision and inability to consult with their employees.”
The redundancies come after the publishing company revealed at the end of last year it would be seeking to make $40m in cuts.
The plans to “modernise” its editorial operations also follow on from Fairfax Media’s announcement in April that it would be restructuring its metro editorial team.
Fairfax journalists went on a seven-day strike in protest of the cuts once the restructure details revealed 125 editorial jobs face the chop.
Miranda Ward worked for Mumbrella from 2013 to 2017, eventually becoming deputy editor. Miranda joined Mumbrella in September 2013 from Sky News.
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