Keeping it Real…

This is a story about Mike McCardell that really is not a story about Mike McCardell.

There are few British Columbia television viewers who haven’t seen his reports, about people and places in the Lower Mainland,  rounding out the tail-end of  CanWest Global’s Newshour five times a week. 

People love his human interest stories … or hate them … but they are popular enough to hold many Newshour viewers to the end of the show, instead of dropping off  after the weather or into the sports segment.

For Mike, it has been a great gig … and he is truly adept at what may look like a simple task … talking to people and making what they say appeal to a mass market television audience … but it takes skilfull reporting, writing and editing.

But a problem arose for Mike and Global a few months ago. Mike turned 65: retirement age at Global. 

Uh-oh! What to do? Just let him keep working ….   something that could be cited by other staff, less talented or less popular with management, but who might also want to stay on beyond “normal” retirement age?   Apparently that’s not Global policy.

But Mike wanted to keep working and the company wanted him to keep working. 

 The solution?  Mike officially went into retirement a few months ago, and took a bit of a break (perhaps long enough to start collecting his Canada Pension?      And then apparently Global “rehired” him ….  not as a regular full time employee, but under a special contract.

“I have a fine contract with a good company that has a strong union with a job that I love and I am able to keep doing it,”  Mike explained me in an e-mail Tuesday.

Ahhh yes, the Union.   Strong union. 

Well, it turns out Mike’s new deal worries Mike’s union.

The fear is that Brother McCardell’s special contract with the company could be “thin edge of the wedge” … that could allow the company to hire reporters under a separate arrangement or contract, at whatever wage or per story rate is negotiated … possibly ignoring union wage scales,  hours of work, overtime and  other provisions/responsibilities under the signed union agreement with Global ….  and even without company-paid  health benefits.

Whoa!  What kind of a union shop is that!

So earlier this month, the Newshour’s CanWest Global union, CEP Local 841-M grieved the new McCardell  arrangement …. because  it fears a precedent  that could prove suicidal for the union in the future if it doesn’t stop such hiring arrangements for reporters.

CEP 814-M President Mark Cameron declined to publicly comment on the specific grievance over McCardell, noting it has not yet been discussed with the company.  But he added ” the first goal of CEP Local  814-M is to solve any grievance filed.”

Global News Director Ian Haysom was more forthcoming:

“We don’t see the Mike McCardell contract as any precedent … he’s very much the exception to the rule. He had reached retirement age, but we wanted to continue a relationship with him because he brings a special element to the show,”  Haysom wrote in an e-mail response to my query.

“He’s a personality, bringing his own quirky touch to the newscasts. He’s won national and regional awards for commentary. As a bestselling author and a BC institution, we think Mike is a special — and rare — case.,” he added.

Few of Mike’s fellow co-workers would argue with that … but they wonder why the company didn’t just allow him to keep working beyond 65 as a full time employee under the union contract? 

Or follow the rules and post his job when they decided to hire him back after his “retirement”?

After all, he is not just working occasionally or temporarily … but five days a week .. just as he did before,   when he was classified as a permanent employee.

Union members are wondering how many other reporters and writers might the company find down the road with “special” qualifications that the company might feel would allow them to also work outside the union agreement?

And if there were ever another strike (Global workers were out for 33 days in 1998), would these “special” writers and reporters who work outside the contract, keep working?

The fear is real, the concerns are real, the grievance is real.

Meanwhile Mike, my sources say, is still paying union dues. But from the union’s point of view, that clearly is not enough.

With a grievance now filed, it’s quite evident Mike’s union brothers and sisters are concerned that special contracts like his could ”do in” their union agreement …  and ultimately their union shop.

Harv Oberfeld

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