Economy
Mercury in Parliament
PLANS to ship editing of the Mercury newspaper offshore will be raised in the Tasmanian Parliament today.
Jim Wilkinson, member for the division of Nelson in the Legislative Council, will raise his concerns at the plans by News Ltd to export Tasmanian sub-editing jobs interstate.
Mercury editor Garry Bailey goes to Sydney to meet News Ltd bosses on Tuesday, April 19, to establish how many jobs will be taken from the Hobart newspaper and exported offshore.
Australian Greens leader Bob Brown has vowed to raise the issue in the Senate at its next sitting day on May 10.
Senator Brown’s office yesterday confirmed it has written directly to News Ltd chief executive John Hartigan in a bid to stop the moves.
Tasmanian Economic Development Minister David O’Byrne, who addressed a passionate public rally on the issue at Parliament House lawns last week, has also written to Mr Hartigan asking that he reconsider the plans.
The Mercury has lost about 40 jobs across all departments in the past 18 months.
Management has confirmed it is investigating selling the newspaper’s historic Macquarie St building in Hobart.
In a turbulent time for the 160-year-old newspaper, it’s chief reporter Sue Neales announced last week she is leaving, along with political reporter Damien Brown, who is going to the ABC.
Independent Australia:
Tension is rising in Hobart at News Limited plans to export Tasmanian sub-editing jobs to Melbourne and edit the state’s major newspaper interstate. Hobart Alderman DAMON THOMAS reports:
TASMANIA has an enviable reputation for quality and accountability in all we do and make as a society. It is an intensely proud State — it prides itself in doing things differently.
So should globalism as a worldwide trend with job rationalisations and upheavals stop at Flinders Island?
If you attended the ‘Save the Mercury’ rally on the Parliament House lawn recently, you could be excused for thinking that it did, or should, given the raw emotion of those present. Maybe it’s a Tasmanian thing to buck a trend of cost-cutting so accepted elsewhere.
What price does the loss of local employment and local sub-editing of primarily local news content have in an island State where local knowledge is king?
The Franklin dam protest was remarkable in its conclusion, the gay law reform another, as too the fact that Tasmania had the first licensed casino in the nation.
Will the threat of the loss of sub-editor jobs be the next test of this island State’s resolve to buck the trend?
What impact does a decision of this type convey?
As a small State and with the Mercury having a virtual monopoly of editorial content south of the “Ross Line” there’s always been a certain need for implicit trust in the relationship the readership has with the Mercury.
Trust is many sided but at the heart is …
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First published: 2011-04-14 08:15 AM