APTN news staff seek union certification

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The Aboriginal Peoples Television Network's news and current affairs employees have asked the Canadian Media Guild to represent them as a union.

"Congratulations, APTN news department employees," Gerry Whelang, a union organizer with the media guild wrote in an email to the employees affected on March 12. "This is a day to celebrate."

After more than 50 per cent of the staff members signed cards indicating their interest in becoming unionized, the guild filed an application with the Canada Industrial Relations Board, which has the authority to issue a certificate recognizing them as a bargaining unit.

The application only covers editorial employees in news and current affairs. Whelang told Windspeaker he will continue the campaign to unionize employees who work in technical, Web and administrative areas.

Whelang said he first took an interest in the new television network last October.

"I was interested in APTN because I knew they weren't organized and when I approached a number of people they were interested in talking to us," he said.

Asked if he approached the employees or they approached him, he said it was "a combo."

Several staff members told this publication a few months ago, they were concerned about their job security at the network. The bureau in Yellowknife and a reporting position in Toronto remain unmanned and the planned expansion to a city in Quebec has not occurred.

News director Dan David left the network and anchor Carol Adams left to take a job with the CBC.

Whelang said he sent notification of the employees' desire to form a union to APTN management and received an answer the same day, even though the regulations gave them 10 days to respond. He said the promptness of the company's response surprised him.

"They came back a couple of hours later. The company came back through (APTN chief operating officer) Ron Nadeau and said they won't be filing any objection to the news and current affairs being organized," he said on March 23.

The company's deadline to file an objection was March 26. Work on the first collective bargaining agreement will start soon after the certification becomes official and the local forms an executive and appoints negotiators.

Sources within APTN say that after the departure of David, whose position is being filled on a temporary basis by the network's head of programming, Jim Compton, reporters felt not having someone with a strong journalism background making the decisions about which stories to cover could be a problem.

"I heard that resoundingly from people that that was one of the things that was a small amount of frustration to people," the organizer said.

Nadeau sent a memo to his staff on March 15 saying he had been informed that they wanted to join the union.

"We respect that choice and will not object to certification of a bargaining unit comprising news department editorial staff," he wrote. "As always, we will deal with our staff in a fair and caring manner, whether they are unionized or not."

He said a pay equity review that is in progress at the network will continue.

"This review will include all staff and adjustments to pay and benefits which are determined as a result of the review will be implemented immediately for non-union staff and will be part of our negotiation proposals for unionized staff," Nadeau wrote.