Guardian and Observer journalists have agreed they may take industrial action in protest at plans to sell The Observer to Tortoise Media.
The move comes as a group of prominent cultural figures, many of whom have contributed to The Observer, submitted an open letter to Press Gazette blasting the possible sale, saying it is “disastrous” and values the paper “at or near zero”.
Up to 400 staff attended a meeting of the combined Guardian and Observer NUJ chapel on Thursday (3 October) where strong feelings were aired opposing the deal.
The packed mandatory meeting went on for more than an hour and was a mixture of in-person and via Google Meet.
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Two votes were passed unanimously: to put the matter “into dispute” and “if necessary” to hold “industrial action”.
The Guardian and Observer titles are owned by the Scott Trust, whose purpose is “to secure the financial and editorial independence of the Guardian in perpetuity…remaining faithful to its liberal tradition”.
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Press Gazette understands staff complained about what was seen as a failure of the Trust to protect plural liberal journalism in tough times. Some spoke about a sense of “betrayal” amongst Observer journalists who have worked at the company for 30 years or more.
There was also concern raised that readers who have made financial donations in order to support Observer journalism will feel misled if the title is sold.
Mention was also made of The Guardian’s “Not For Sale” marketing campaign last year which emphasised the title’s editorial independence. Some staff at the meeting said it was ironic that in fact The Observer did seem to be for sale and apparently at a nominal price.
Guardian Media Group announced on 17 September that it was in a period of exclusive negotiations to sell The Observer to Tortoise Media, which is mainly a podcast publisher.
Tortoise founder and main shareholder James Harding has not yet revealed who is financially backing The Observer bid which is said to include £25m of investment over five years (over and above the title’s running costs). But he has assured staff that the deal will be a boost to liberal journalism.
Around 70 Observer staff would transfer over with the deal.
Both the Scott Trust and Guardian management appear keen to do the deal, with chief executive Anna Bateson describing it as “an exciting opportunity” to build The Observer and “allow The Guardian to focus on its growth strategy”.
Press Gazette understands that Harding has met with some Observer staff but there are still widespread concerns about job security if the deal goes through. Guardian and Observer journalists currently benefit from an NUJ house agreement which includes a no compulsory redundancies promise.
A Guardian spokesperson said: “We are in negotiations about the offer from Tortoise Media to buy the Observer and we are grateful to everyone who has fed their thoughts into discussions so far. One of the reasons for being transparent about the offer was so that we could openly engage with Observer staff. There is still a lot of information to work through and we will continue to discuss internally.”
Prominent cultural figures blast Tortoise bid for The Observer in open letter
Also on Thursday a group of more than 70 prominent UK cultural figures including Oscar-winning actors and directors and some of the UK’s leading novelists and playwrights addressed an open letter to the Scott Trust and Guardian Media Group describing the possible deal as “a betrayal” and calling on them “to reject this ill-considered offer at once”.
Among the signatories were actor Ralph Fiennes, musician and broadcaster Jarvis Cocker, broadcaster Carole Vorderman, playwright Tom Stoppard and actress Lesley Manville.
The letter in full:
The news that the Guardian chief executive and editor-in-chief are actively considering a takeover of the Observer by Tortoise has left us shocked and dismayed. While Tortoise is a respected media outlet, we believe that the move would be disastrous for the world’s oldest Sunday newspaper and its journalists, for the Guardian and for liberal journalism.
While figures of £100m are being bid for other publications, this poorly funded approach sets the value of the Observer at or near zero. The proposal also envisages moving it from a resilient and well-funded newspaper publisher to a small, loss-making digital startup whose funding for the takeover would in all likelihood come from private equity.
Is Tortoise really committed to continuing with the Observer in print? If it were to discontinue the newspaper or if the business were to fail, the Guardian’s editor-in-chief and chief executive and the Scott Trust, which owns Guardian Media Group, would go down in history as being responsible for the demise of the last liberal Sunday newspaper.
The immediate financial threat to the newspaper’s journalism, and its staff, is clear. Even if it were to survive, the Observer would be much changed – cut off from its network of foreign correspondents, sports reporters and business journalists. Leading writers, familiar to the paper’s readers for years, would be gone. Guardian supporters would lose the Observer’s voice and presence on the Guardian website and app. And if, as seems inevitable, the Observer’s politics, arts and culture coverage is to go behind a paywall, then its unique voice in Britain’s national conversation will be muted.
The Scott Trust, the Observer’s parent for 30 years, prides itself on providing a home for journalism free from the taint of corporate interests. Its engagement with this offer, however, suggests that the Observer’s award-winning reporting is something that the organisation, with its £1.3bn endowment, is no longer interested in protecting.
We call on Guardian Media Group and the Scott Trust to reject this ill-considered offer at once, and to retain the Observer as a key element of its seven-day print and online operation. Failure to do so would be a betrayal of the Observer, its staff and its readers.
Yours sincerely,
Monica Ali (author)
Joan Bakewell (journalist and peer)
Julian Barnes (author)
Mary Beard (classicist and broadcaster)
Frank Cottrell Boyce (screenwriter and novelist)
Rosie Boycott (journalist and peer)
Asa Butterfield (actor)
Dorothy Byrne (former television news executive)
Simon Callow (actor)
Bridget Christie (comedian)
Eliza Clark (author)
Jarvis Cocker (musician and broadcaster)
Jonathan Coe (author)
Richard Coles (author and priest)
Stephen Daldry (director and producer)
Janie Dee (actress)
Jeremy Deller (artist)
Clint Dyer (director and actor)
Richard Eyre (director)
Ralph Fiennes (actor and producer)
Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall (chef and broadcaster)
Nicole Flattery (author)
Michael Frayn (playwright and author)
Mark Gatiss (actor and director)
Bobby Gillespie (musician)
Howard Goodall (composer)
Hugh Grant (actor)
Colin Greenwood (musician)
Philippa Gregory (author)
Sheila Hancock (actress)
David Hare (playwright and director)
Robert Harris (author)
Lord Peter Hennessy (historian and peer)
Billy Howle (actor)
Toby Jones (actor)
Asif Kapadia (filmmaker)
Jackie Kay (poet and author)
Helena Kennedy (barrister and peer)
Peter Kosminsky (writer and director)
David Kynaston (historian)
Duncan Kenworthy OBE (producer)
Daisy Lafarge (author and poet)
David Lan (playwright)
Dame Hermione Lee (biographer and academic)
Anton Lesser (actor)
Adrian Lester (actor and director)
Damian Lewis (actor)
Joe Lycett (comedian)
Caroline Lucas (politician)
Lesley Manville (actress)
Robert McCrum (author)
David Morrissey (actor and fiilmmaker)
Ian McEwan (author and screenwriter)
Robert Macfarlane (author and academic)
Sophie Mackintosh (author)
Sienna Miller (actress)
Abi Morgan (playwright and screenwriter)
Michael Morpurgo (author)
Mike Newell (director)
Bill Nighy (actor)
Megan Nolan (author)
James O’Brien (broadcaster)
Mark O’Connell (writer)
Andi Oliver (chef)
Michael Ondaatje (poet and writer)
Richard Ovenden (librarian and author)
Chris Packham (naturalist and broadcaster)
Pawel Pawlikowski (filmmaker)
Maxine Peake (actress)
Alistair Petrie (actor)
Jonathan Pryce (actor)
Philip Pullman (author)
Steve Punt (comedian)
Mark Rylance (actor)
Michael Rosen (author)
Dominic Savage (director)
Tom Shakespeare (sociologist)
Lemn Sissay (author and broadcaster)
Gillian Slovo (author)
Tom Stoppard (playwright and screenwriter)
Olivia Sudjic (author)
Wolfgang Tilmans (photographer)
Carol Vorderman (broadcaster)
Harriet Walter (actress)
John Ware (journalist)
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