La Presse says it will close if no agreement reached

MONTREAL – La Presse, North America’s largest French-language broadsheet newspaper, will close Dec. 1 if its 700 employees don’t agree to $13 million in concessions by that date.

Caroline Jamet, the 125-year-old newspaper’s vice-president of communications, confirmed publisher Guy Crevier sent an e-mail Thursday informing workers they have three months to reach an agreement to avoid suspension of both the paper and its website, cyberpresse.ca.

In acknowledging La Presse’s current business model "has no chance of surviving," Crevier noted how management has cut its share of the $26 million needed to be reduced this year to continue operations and that contract negotiations must be sped up to get the other half from the 600 unionized workers.

"We have to reduce our cost structure and the only missing link is the contribution of the employees," Jamet said.

She said the main issue is the 32-hour, four-day work week that the company wants changed to 35 hours over five days because of the expense of extra staff for that fifth day.

That move would likely result in the loss of about 100 jobs, but Jamet added retirements and voluntary departures could reduce the number of layoffs.

Union representatives were in meetings Thursday and could not be reached for comment.

Both sides have been in contract talks since the last collective agreement expired Dec. 31.

Jamet said the measures being taken at La Presse have no effect on the chain’s other dailies: Le Soleil in Quebec City, La Tribune in Sherbrooke, Le Nouvelliste in Trois-Rivieres, La Voix de l’Est in Granby, Le Quotidien in Saguenay and Le Droit in Ottawa.

It is up to the publishers at each of those papers to identify how to cut their costs, she added.