POST AND MAIL - WHERE'S OUR MONEY GONE?

03-10-2007

Hacked off hacks at the Birmingham Post and Mail aren't too worried about Trinity Mirror's decision to cancel a long-awaited management buyout. What's really bothering them is fate of the £300 loyalty bonus they were promised when the company was put up for sale.

Recognising that periods of uncertainty can undermine morale, Trinity Mirror offered the incentive ten months ago when they first invited offers for its Midlands group of newspapers ten months ago.

This was no act of kindness, mind. It was based on hard-headed business principles.

With TM keeping hold of the printing presses and having sold off the Post and Mail building, the titles of the papers and the people who worked for them were the only assets remaining.

Now that it's been decided the offer wasn't big enough, staff who hung around are calling on the NUJ to secure the payout they were promised.

That won't come cheap - Trinity Mirror has around 1200 employees across the Midlands Group, meaning that the bill will come to more than £360,000.

If shareholders don't fancy footing the bill maybe they could ask chief executive Sly Bailey for a contribution - last year she trousered a bonus of £775,000 on top of her £1million a year salary.

It's not only the grunts who are unhappy, mind.

Senior bosses who've spent the best part of a year working on the management buyout are now being asked to work their nuts off for the same company which has, in their eyes, pulled the rug from under their feet.

There is one upside, though; now it's been confirmed the Birmingham papers are moving to Fort Dunlop, it will mean the journos can have new computer - the current technology is more than a decade old.