Kim and AFTRA Bug Out of Phase One Agreement! SAG Responds!
.: . Date: Tuesday 2/5/2008
Actors unions break ranks AFTRA will negotiate separately from SAG in talks with studios.
By Richard Verrier, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer February 4, 2008
The American Federation of Television and Radio Artists has made good on its threat to break ranks with its more powerful sister union, the Screen Actors Guild. AFTRA's board of directors voted Saturday to separately negotiate its upcoming prime-time television contract with the major studios -- without SAG at the bargaining table.
The decision effectively ends a 27-year partnership between the two unions under which they had jointly negotiated film and prime-time TV contracts. It also could complicate key upcoming negotiations for actors, whose contract expires June 30, potentially allowing the studios to play off one union against the other.
Tensions between the groups, which have clashed over turf and contract terms in cable TV, boiled over recently when SAG's board urged members to scrap the long-standing agreement and replace it with one that is more equitable. SAG's beef is that it must split votes with AFTRA, even though the guild's members account for the vast majority of earnings.
SAG represents 120,000 film and TV actors. AFTRA has more than 70,000 members, including journalists, broadcasters and recording artists. The unions have 44,000 members in common. For its part, AFTRA has accused SAG of being run by a militant Hollywood faction that wants to muzzle the voice of moderates.
"AFTRA has a responsibility to move forward and negotiate our agreement for prime-time network TV dramatic programming," AFTRA National President Roberta Reardon said. "We cannot abdicate our fiduciary obligations to AFTRA members by allowing another institution to dictate the terms of our long-standing contracts or control our negotiating timeline."
In a statement, SAG President Alan Rosenberg called Reardon's claims "untrue" and said his union was committed to producing a "fairer, stronger bargaining relationship" between the two unions, not ending the partnership altogether.
Both SAG and AFTRA have begun preparing for negotiations on a new contract to replace one that expires June 30. AFTRA is expected to begin negotiations in early March.
On Sunday, AFTRA said the AFL-CIO, the nation's largest labor federation, had granted its request for a charter. AFTRA, which has been affiliated with a separate actors federation, said the charter affirms its goal of becoming an independent union and will give it more clout in negotiations as well as put it on a more equal footing with other labor groups, such as the American Federation of Musicians. http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/news/tv/la-fi-aftra4feb04,1,3892224.story?track=rssrichard.verrier@latimes.com
Residuals Bug Us
Speaking of which,ah, don't Bug Out before you get the Ol' Dog's perspective on AFTRA's Enroachment of SAG contracts. I'll have them following Dave McNary's incisive article and a SAG Press Release
Posted Feb, 3rd 2008
AFTRA offers early talks
Org targets SAG with offer to majors
By DAVE MCNARY
Taking the offensive in its brutal divorce battle with the Screen Actors Guild, the American Federation of Television & Radio Artists aims to beat SAG to the negotiating table: It'll launch talks with the majors for primetime TV work by early March.
"We have told the companies we will be ready to go at the start of next month," AFTRA national exec director Kim Roberts Hedgpeth told Daily Variety on Sunday, a day after AFTRA's national board approved a resolution to move ahead without SAG.
The AMPTP had no comment about the AFTRA move, but it's likely that the companies will take the union up on its invitation. The majors are, not surprisingly, much more eager to negotiate a deal with AFTRA than with SAG, the WGA's closest ally during the three-month writers strike -- particularly after SAG prexy Alan Rosenberg and exec director Doug Allen recently decried the DGA's tentative deal.
"We felt what SAG did, while the DGA deal was still out for ratification, was completely inappropriate," Hedgpeth said.
The current SAG-AFTRA contract covering work by actors in features and primetime expires June 30. If primetime negotiations with AFTRA begin without SAG, the SAG-AFTRA divorce would become official in that it would unquestionably end the "Phase I" agreement on joint negotiations that's been in effect since 1981.
SAG has about 120,000 members working in film, TV and commercials, while AFTRA has 70,000 including actors, broadcasters, singers, dancers and announcers. About 40,000 thesps are dual cardholders. Projects shot for film are generally under SAG's jurisdiction; those shot to tape are AFTRA's. But the growing use of digital media is blurring those lines.
An AFTRA primetime deal would have profound implications for actors even though it covers only a handful of primetime programs (CBS' "Rules of Engagement," Fox's "'Til Death," ABC's "Cashmere Mafia") and no feature work.
Under such a deal, it would be able to lure producers of new shows to sign at lower rates than SAG's -- which could provoke SAG to retaliate by telling its 120,000 members not to work on AFTRA shows or starting to sign up shows in AFTRA's traditional jurisdiction such as soaps and talkers.
For its part, SAG responded Sunday by blaming AFTRA for the breakup and accusing AFTRA of being undemocratic, noting that SAG has scheduled a referendum asking members to approve ending Phase I, with ballots to be sent out Feb. 15 and due back by March 31.
But Hedgpeth and AFTRA prexy Roberta Reardon said it's irrelevant what SAG wants since it violated Phase I by instituting bloc voting among its negotiating committee members.
"AFTRA has a responsibility to move forward and negotiate our agreement for primetime network TV dramatic programming," Reardon said. "We cannot abdicate our fiduciary obligations to AFTRA members by allowing another institution to dictate the terms of our longstanding contracts or control our negotiating timeline."
In response, Rosenberg said AFTRA is lying.
"AFTRA is free to end our joint bargaining relationship, but they cannot excuse that action by saying that SAG has done anything to abrogate Phase I. That is simply untrue," he added. "We are at this very moment engaged in an effort to put the question of our joint bargaining relationship to a vote of the SAG membership, a democratic courtesy AFTRA does not afford their members."
Although the two unions have launched their "wages and working conditions" meetings to seek member input, signs of divorce have already emerged. Those confabs, formerly termed "joint meetings," are now described by AFTRA as "co-hosted."
And though the brawl between the two performers unions has gone mostly unnoticed during the WGA strike, SAG and AFTRA have gone to the mat during the past year on a variety of topics.
SAG's beef with AFTRA stems from the latter's refusal to reduce its 50-50 participation on the negotiating committees for film-TV and on commercials -- despite accounting for less than 10% of the earnings. In addition, SAG complained that AFTRA has been offering producers cheaper contracts in basic cable.
AFTRA has accused SAG leaders of being "radical" and inflexible, asserting that its "one size fits all" approach to contracts is resulting in fewer union jobs as producers shoot in Canada or go non-union.
SAG members outside of Hollywood have been supportive of AFTRA. And the unions also remain at odds over how to resolve jurisdictional disputes.
AFTRA also announced Sunday that it's been awarded a direct charter with the AFL-CIO, asserting it will make it easier to work with other AFL-CIO unions such as the Communications Workers of America, IATSE and American Federation of Musicians. Reardon said the charter means that the AFL-CIO will resolve jurisdictional disputes involving AFTRA rather than the Associated Actors and Artistes of America.
But Rosenberg responded by saying that AFTRA's affiliation has a key condition that AFTRA continue to belong to the Associated Actors and Artistes of America and settle jurisdictional fights through that org.
To: SAG National Board of Directors, Division Board of Directors and Branch Presidents
(Los Angeles, February 3, 2008) -- Screen Actors Guild released the following statement on behalf of National President Alan Rosenberg who is also a member of the AFL-CIO Executive Council:
“We have been notified that the AFL-CIO has determined that branch unions of the Associated Actors and Artistes of America (Four A’s), including Equity, AFTRA or SAG, may upon request become and remain directly chartered by the AFL-CIO. However, at Screen Actors Guild’s request, such direct AFL-CIO affiliation will be in effect only so long as the affiliating union continues to be a member of the Four A’s and remains bound by the obligations of such membership. Four A’s membership particularly includes the obligation to resolve jurisdictional disputes through the Four A’s dispute resolution process.
“We are pleased that the AFL-CIO has preserved the Four A’s, the esteemed and traditional home of actors’ unions. We are further gratified that the AFL-CIO has rejected AFTRA’s attempt to diminish Four A’s solidarity by withdrawing from Four A’s membership to seek a direct charter.
“Today’s comments by Roberta Reardon, AFTRA president, indicate that AFTRA has unilaterally ended its joint bargaining relationship with Screen Actors Guild. AFTRA is free to end our joint bargaining relationship, but they cannot excuse that action by saying that SAG has done anything to abrogate Phase I -- that is simply untrue. We are at this very moment engaged in an effort to put the question of our joint bargaining relationship to a vote of the SAG membership, a democratic courtesy AFTRA does not afford their members.
“If SAG members vote to end Phase I, we will, once again, attempt to engage AFTRA in substantive negotiations aimed at producing a fairer, stronger bargaining relationship. It is up to the leadership of AFTRA whether they choose to participate in that effort.
“Screen Actors Guild’s position is unchanged: It is our intention to serve our membership by negotiating jointly with AFTRA in a way that is fair to the membership of both organizations, and especially to the 44,000 dual card holders that comprise more than two thirds of AFTRA’s active, paid up membership. To do that, we are seeking a vote of our membership in keeping with the democratic practices and policies of our union. Although AFTRA may not choose to consult their members on issues that so significantly impact actors lives, such communication with our members is essential to the democratic process valued by Screen Actors Guild.”
Alan Rosenberg
President, Screen Actors Guild
Member, AFL-CIO Executive Council
---
Excuse me, President Rosenberg, but I say Tell Them to Bug Off, and if they don't, smash 'em! They are predators of actors; they undercut SAG’s contracts, taking away actors residuals, and diminishing their P&H!
It’s time to stop playing nice. According to media reports, they have arbitrarily ended Phase One, by the way, without bothering to have a referendum of their membership!
The deal is done, kaput! We had a contract, they’ve violated it. There’s no need for a referendum now. I appreciate that we have a democratic union, but what value is there in a referendum for the members to vote on something that has been terminated by the other side.
Look, since, constitutionally, it takes a two-thirds vote of the board to end Phase One, and since New York and the branches would never help reach that two-thirds majority, necessitating this referendum in the first place, how about this: Now that their pals at AFTRA have apparently terminated the agreement, why don’t they come aboard and vote to end Phase One, and spare the membership the cost of a referendum that now seems to be unnecessary
TIME IS OF THE ESSENCE, WE NEED TO ACT INCISIVELY NOW BEFORE THEY CAN DO MORE DAMAGE TO ACTORS LIVELIHOODS.
First thing SAG needs to do is drop out of the AFL-CIO. It doesn’t take a lot of extrapolating to realize that this is all part of a bigger plan by AFL-CIO’s John Sweeny, AFTRA’s Kim Hedgpeth, MPAA’s Robert Pisano, IATSE's Tom Short, the ATA’s Karen Stuart, and the AMPTP to undermine and eventually break the Screen Actors Guild. As Lew Wasserman stated “a compliant union is a good union.”
And if there is one thing AFTRA is that is compliant. If the AFL-CIO can help them become the preeminent actors union, they’ll be assured of labor unrest. None of those pesky SAG militants causing work stoppages by demanding livable wages, and such nonsense as residuals. Hey, most of their workers don’t get residuals, and AFTRA’s leadership has proven that they agree.
Now, if you think the AFL-CIO’s John Sweeny is a friend of SAG watch the following video. He praises AFTRA President Roberta Reardon, a leader in AFTRA’s poaching and low-balling of SAG’s contracts.
Isn’t it ironic that while, on one hand, he is awarding AFTRA a Charter, that on the other hand, he is completely ignoring the mandate of SAG’s AFL-CIO/4A’s jurisdictional Charter because it doesn’t suit his agenda.
It’s time for SAG to assert its jurisdiction awarded by the 4A’s jurisdictional arm of the AFL-CIO, which gives SAG jurisdiction over all shows except those done in the manner of a live broadcast.
If the 4A’s head, Theodore Bikel refuses to enforce its own charter, fine at least actors will know where Mr. Bikel stands on AFTRA’s poaching and low-balling of their contracts.
It’s time to truly enforce Rule One globally by enforcing it here in the USA. Inform Producers that SAG members only work under SAG contracts on shows under SAG’s jurisdiction--and that includes all dramatic shows on TV except those done in the manner of a live broadcast.
Look, the only reason producers are going to AFTRA is because they can get SAG actors through AFTRA’s backdoor. Board up that entrance, and AFTRA’s poaching and low-balling will be done. If SAG doesn’t start acting like the most powerful actors union in the world, it will soon find that it will be subservient to the AFL-CIO, AFTRA, the ATA, and the AMPTP.
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Kim and AFTRA Bug Out of Phase One Agreement! SAG Responds!
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