CBC, Media Guild reach agreement

While the news release is positively gushing, in fact it is newsworthy that these two long-term combatants managed to come to a deal without a strike or a lockout, which is more normally the case. Guess the recession is having some positive effect if it is forcing employers and unions to come to terms instead of staking out moral positions. Apparently the Guild and Le Journal do Montreal are getting together to try to come to some kind of settlement in their strike/lockout.

News release, Feb. 3 2009

Aspers to lose control of CanWest?

The Globe and Mail, competitor to Canwest media, notes that the CanWest debt problem is appearing to be insurmountable, as CanWest basically is trying to get out of/restructure existing debt agreements. In a credit crunch, carrying a lot of debt isn’t a good thing. Should there be an asset sale, somebody might pick up a newspaper or tv station for pennies on the dollar — or CanWest might convince its lenders that it’s better to renegotiate a debt and get it back, rather than foreclose and get those pennies on a dollar.

Globe and Mail, Fec. 3 2009