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Pay the writer!
Why Canada's content producers need a union
Stephanie O’Hanley
Photography by Reuters: Mario Anzuoni
You could say writing is in my DNA. I’ve been a freelance journalist for 14 years. These days I write for Hour Magazine and the Montreal Gazette on topics such as heirloom seed fairs and labour disputes. I love the field because I am always learning something new, and when I’m not writing, I feel miserable. The joys of my work, however, are being overshadowed by lousy working conditions for writers in Canada.
While other costs associated with publishing—paper, computers, software, rent, electricity, etc.—have risen with inflation, writers’ rates have remained unchanged for 30 years. According to a 2006 Professional Writers Association of Canada survey, more than half of freelance writers today earn less than $25,000 a year. And, as if that wasn’t bad enough, freelancers are being forced to sign contracts relinquishing all rights to their work just to earn that meagre paycheque.
The recent television writers’ strike in the United States briefly exposed the plight of content producers, and many Canadian writers stood in solidarity, refusing to accept work created by the strike. Victory for the U.S. writers would have been impossible without a union, and while our situation may be quite different, Canadian freelancers face these very same core issues.
Trying to unionize freelance writers may seem akin to herding cats, but the Communications, Energy and Paperworkers Union is trying to do just that. The CEP is in the beginning stages of organizing a Canadian Freelance Union, which is meant to work like the Alliance of Canadian Cinema, Television and Radio Artists (ACTRA) does for recorded media performers. I sincerely hope it works.
I recently sold a 400-word article to the Montreal Gazette for $150. I signed Canwest’s latest freelance agreement, which was introduced last year and is particularly nasty. For $150, the Gazette bought the right to use my story in perpetuity in “The Gazette and all Canwest properties,” as well as in third-party print, broadcast, online, digital and other media, as well as the “right to repurpose and/or resell in any media worldwide.” I signed away my moral rights, too, which means my work can be reused however Canwest sees fit and can run without my byline.
Not bad for $150, especially when you consider the media giant is reporting quarterly earnings in the millions, and relies on content to sell papers and ads. Perhaps ironically, I also promised my articles and services “will not become subject to any union or collective bargaining agreement.”
Sure, I can refuse to sign, and I have refused in the past, but that means I don’t write for Montreal’s only English-language daily. If my fellow writers and I don’t organize, we may soon no longer be able to stay in the field.
