Nine Entertainment

The Story

• 2012Fairfax Media (later acquired by Nine) announced 1,900 total job cuts. 66 subediting jobs targeted to move to New Zealand. Staff staged a 36-hour wildcat strike across the SMH, Age, AFR, Newcastle Herald, and Canberra Times. [Green Left]
• 201280 editorial production staff made redundant as Fairfax outsourced subediting of the SMH, The Age, Sun-Herald, and Sunday Age to AAP-owned Pagemasters. [Mumbrella]
• 2014Fairfax ended the Pagemasters contract and moved all subediting to its New Zealand office — 40 more jobs in the air. NZ labour costs were roughly half Australian rates. [Mumbrella]
• 2016Less than two years later, Fairfax moved NZ subediting back to Pagemasters after quality problems — ABC's Media Watch had criticised duplicated stories appearing on multiple pages. 70 jobs shuffled again. [Mumbrella]
• May 2019After acquiring Fairfax, Nine reversed the outsourcing and brought sub-editors back in-house, creating 24 new positions. Executive editor James Chessell: 'This will better enable the three mastheads to raise the quality of their journalism.' But 70 jobs were originally outsourced — only 24 restored. [Mumbrella]

All facts sourced from public reporting. No editorial commentary. Click source links to verify.