The China Times' labor union petitioned the newspaper's president, Yu Chi-chung (
"We just want to get a chance to negotiate with our employer and to reach a consensus on provisions for early retirement and layoffs," the labor union said in a statement.
At least 1,000 employees will be laid off or asked to retire early during the second phase of the paper's restructuring, according to the union. After four meetings between the labor union and the newspaper's management, negotiations have broken down. The union is now seeking the help of Yu Chi-chung.
"The group's general manager, Yu Chien-hsin (
Yu Chien-hsin, son of Yu Chi-chung, was unavailable for comment yesterday. It is unclear whether Yu Chi-chung, whose influence in the newspaper has diminished, can do anything to help union members.
On Aug. 2, the newspaper announced a program to encourage 500 of its employees to retire early.
"Rather than coming up with the provisions to encourage employees to retire early, all the departments' heads have been forcing individual employees to comply. The real meaning of encouraged early retirement is forced retirement," the union's statement said.
The union complained that the compensation employees are scheduled to receive will be the lowest from any newspaper in Taiwan.
The China Times has been implementing measures to solve its financial problems, which include restructuring the newspaper's layout to reduce paper use, dismissing editors in its Taichung and Kaohsiung offices and combining the resources of the group's three newspapers.
The China Times Group publishes two morning dailies -- the Commercial Times and the China Times, as well as the evening paper the China Times Express.
Employees are currently required to learn extra skills. If they fail to learn those skills, they will be fired.
The newspaper group will increase its employees' working hours to a mandatory eight-hour day starting in September. The newspaper is expected to fire 500 employees starting in October.
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