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SAG-AFTRA president slams studios for halting labor contract talks By City News Service
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AG-AFTRA President Fran Drescher Friday slammed the major Hollywood studios for suspending contract talks, two days after negotiations broke down in the ongoing labor standoff. Appearing on NBC’s Friday Show to give her perspective on the nowstalled negotiations between the actors union and the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers, Drescher said the breakdown “really came as a shock to me.” “What does that exactly mean and why would you walk away from the table?” she said. “It’s not like we’re asking for anything that’s so outrageous. It’s so wrong. And it’s so unfair that they walked out of the meeting, and so disrespectful.” The AMPTP, which represents the studios, issued a statement Wednesday saying negotiations were “suspended after SAG-AFTRA presented its most recent proposal on October 11. After meaningful conversations, it is clear that the gap between the
AMPTP and SAG-AFTRA is too great, and conversations are no longer moving us in a productive direction.” The two sides met five times since Oct. 2, their first talks since the SAG-AFTRA strike began July 14, including on Wednesday. “We have negotiated with them in good faith, despite the fact that last week they presented an offer that was, shockingly, worth less than they proposed before the strike began,” according to a statement by SAG-AFTRA Wednesday. The union said studio CEOs “walked away from the bargaining table after refusing to counter our latest offer.” SAG-AFTRA demands include general wage increases, protections against the use of actor images through artificial intelligence, boosts in compensation for successful streaming programs and improvements in health and retirement benefits. In its Wednesday statement, the union contended that the studios “refuse to
Fran Drescher. | Photo courtesy of Gage Skidmore/Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 2.0)
protect performers from being replaced by AI, they refuse to increase your
wages to keep up with inflation and they refuse to share a tiny portion of the
immense revenue your work generates for them.” “We have made big meaningful counters on our end, including completely transforming our revenue share proposal, which would cost the companies less than 57 cents per subscriber each year. They have rejected our proposals and refused to counter.” On Thursday, Netflix co-CEO Ted Sarandos, who has been participating in the talks along with other major studios heads, said during a Bloomberg conference that the negotiations disintegrated over a union proposal to add a “levy” on every streaming service subscriber. According to The Hollywood Reporter, Sarandos told conference attendees that the union rejected a “success-based bonus” revenue model similar to the one recently accepted by the Writers Guild of America union, but which was far more costly. “That was rejected and the counter was this levy on every subscriber and
prior to that was a levy on all revenue, where basically the union will take a certain amount of money for every subscriber to a service,” Sarandos said, according to THR. “That issue we got resolved with the writers was not only accepted in the deal but ratified by a 99 percent vote of the Writers Guild. So I know that these guilds are not created equal and they all have different needs and more bespoke needs, but like I said, that is one that worked that rewarded success, which we agreed with,” according to Sarandos via THR. “But a levy on top of our revenue or per subscriber, with no insight into the revenue per subscriber or anything, we just felt like a bridge too far to add this deep into the negotiation.” The Writers Guild of America ended its strike against the studios on Sept. 27. Members of the WGA ratified the agreement See SAG-AFTRA Page 28
Kaiser reaches tentative deal with union workers By City News Service
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aiser Permanente and the union representing thousands of health care workers reached a tentative deal Friday that could end the labor dispute that resulted in a recent threeday strike. “The frontline healthcare workers of the Coalition of Kaiser Permanente Unions are excited to have reached a tentative agreement with Kaiser Permanente,” the union posted on social media. “We are thankful for the instrumental support of Acting US
Labor Secretary Julie Su.” In a statement Friday, Kaiser said, “The new fouryear agreement will offer Coalition-represented employees competitive wages, excellent benefits, generous retirement income plans, and valuable job training opportunities that support their economic well-being, advance our shared mission, and keep Kaiser Permanente a best place to work and receive care.” Roughly 75,000 workers represented by the Coali-
tion of Kaiser Permanente Unions walked off the job from Oct. 4 through Oct. 6 in what the union billed as the largest health care strike of its kind in U.S. history. Workers walked picket lines across California and in Colorado, Washington, Oregon, Virginia and Washington, D.C. The union coalition has been pushing for higher wages commensurate with inflation, increased staffing and working conditions. According to the Kaiser, the tentative agreement
establishes new minimum wages over three years for Coalition-represented employees that will reach $25 an hour in California and $23 an hour in other states where Kaiser Permanente operates. The tentative deal also provides guaranteed across-the-board wage increases totaling 21% over four years, and increases investments in professional development and job training to help address the staffing crisis, Kaiser said. The tentative agreement now goes to the more than
85,000 Kaiser Permanente employees who are represented by coalition unions for ratification. The ratification process will begin on Wednesday. The Coalition unions have withdrawn their notices for a November strike. The healthcare company previously affirmed its commitment to hiring, confirming that it has already reached a goal of hiring 10,000 new unionrepresented employees before the end of the year. “In total over the past
two years, Kaiser Permanente has hired more than 50,000 people to join our teams,” according to the company. The week of the strike, Kaiser officials issued a statement saying rising inflation has led to a “massive surge” in expenses, and has made it tough for the company to balance taking care of its employees with being affordable to patients. See Kaiser Page 27