Bell Media has eliminated an additional 43 jobs as part of a restructuring it previously announced in February.
The media company had already said it would move its Toronto station CP24 from its Queen Street headquarters to its Scarborough campus this fall, and that business news organization BNN Bloomberg would follow in 2025. The company plans to consolidate these stations with existing networks CTV Toronto, CTV News Channel and CTV National News.
“Since then, Bell has been working with its unions on the implications for our unionized workforce. Today, we are announcing reduction of 43 technicians supporting Bell Media. No departures will occur until the period between August 30 and September 27,” a spokerperson tells Media in Canada. “We will be providing training, offering voluntary severance packages and eliminating vacant positions wherever possible to mitigate the impact on our team members.”
The new cuts affect several production areas, including electronic news gathering (ENG) editors and supervisors, media services coordinators, media services technicians, graphic artists, post-sound and audio-visual technicians, and engineering technicians.
In a statement on Thursday, Unifor, which represents more than 10,000 media workers, said it was “concerned and outraged” that Bell was making another restructuring announcement that the union says could affect 49 “unionized positions” after a round of layoffs earlier this year.
“This is yet another blow to journalism and democracy and a step towards bigger swaths of news deserts across Canada,” Unifor’s statement read.
In June 2023, Bell cut 1,300 media jobs, and in February it laid off 4,800 more workers, 100 of them in midday newscasts at all CTV stations except Toronto, and weekend newscasts at all CTV and CTV2 stations except Toronto, Montreal and Ottawa.
Earlier this year, Unifor launched the “Shame on Bell” campaign (pictured) to call on the company to prioritize local employment and support Canadian workers, stop closing newsrooms and invest in local journalism to ensure community access and diversity, and reduce dividend payments to prioritize reinvestment in employee welfare, job security and infrastructure development.
Bell’s cuts are the second major blow to local news this month. Two weeks ago, 35 members of Unifor at Global News were laid off as part of changes announced at Corus Entertainment.
