Disappointed employees silence YLE television and radio

Walkout to protest planned job cuts

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The television and radio channels of the Finnish Broadcasting Company YLE were silenced by a walkout of personnel between 2:00 PM and midnight on Tuesday.
      YLE's Finnish-language radio stations played only music during the stoppage. Its two television networks showed a black screen with a banner on top informing viewers of the protest action. YLE received numerous angry calls from viewers and listeners over the stoppage.
      The move was a protest against plans to cut more than 400 jobs at YLE. Most of the planned personnel reductions would be implemented in the form of not replacing personnel who retire. However, the company says that it also needs to terminate the employment of 100-200 staff members. The measures were announced by YLE Director-General Mikael Jungner on Monday.
      YLE’s head of administration, Jussi Tunturi, denounced the move as illegal and ill-considered. He said that the walkout hurt television viewers and radio listeners, but not YLE.
     
After walking off their jobs, the employees convened at a nearby auditorium for a mass meeting.
      Speeches focused on unity among personnel groups, calls for softer ways of cutting costs, the defence of the quality of programming, and appeals to management, as well as to the public at large.
      "The message to the licence fee payers is that the existence of YLE is at stake", said journalist Jyrki Saarikoski. He added that he believes that the public appreciates programming that is more than just "taking ten idiots to a desert island to compete with each other".
     
The strikers agreed on the need to balance YLE’s finances. However, there was criticism of the haste with which it is being implemented.
      Participants at the meeting were also concerned at the decline in licence fee revenue. One explanation offered for the situation was the controversy over the appointment of a new director-general last autumn, which led to the resignation of the chairman of the Administrative Council, Markku Laukkanen, and the vice chairman, Jouni Backman. "That is when we lost 15,000 licence fee payers", someone said at the meeting.


Previously in HS International Edition:
  UPDATE: Finnish Broadcasting Company personnel stage walkout to protest planned job cuts (6.9.2005)
  Finnish Broadcasting Company appoints new Director General (17.11.2004)
  Wessberg gets one more year as YLE Director-General (4.10.2004)
  Backman withdraws from YLE leadership race (30.9.2004)

Links:
  YLE web site: This is YLE

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