Fairfax's decision to slash editorial jobs from its metropolitan newsrooms has no bearing on any printing staff, the company has confirmed, despite recent revenue declines.
The media company announced earlier this week that 125 jobs would go from its mastheads across the country, which has prompted a week-long strike from journalists. However, the cuts do not extend to the Fairfax print network, a spokesperson said: "The announcement this week affects metropolitan masthead employees at The Sydney Morning Herald, The Age, The Australian Financial Review, Brisbane Times and WA Today. Our printing sites are unaffected."
Fairfax's overall revenue for the first 17 weeks of the second half of the financial year (26 December 2016 to 23 April 2017) has declined by six percent from last year, with Domain the only segment reporting an increase. Metro and community media are both down approximately 11 percent, New Zealand media down three percent, and Macquarie Media down seven percent.
Greg Hywood, CEO, made no apologies for the cuts at the Macquarie Australia Conference on Thursday, saying the company needed a sustainable publishing business model. "Clearly we have made some tough decisions to make our publishing division sustainable. We don’t back away from it – and are glad that we started getting it in order five years before most other media companies began to face the global and local industry realities.
"It is self-evident that publishing was facing structural challenges and these could only be addressed by completely resetting existing models," Hywood said.
The printed editions of Fairfax's mastheads have continued production during the industrial action.