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Job Security Agreement Key to Contract Settlement Between NBC and NABET-CWA

For Immediate Release
Washington, D.C. – A tentative 4-year contract settlement between NBC and the National Association of Broadcast Employees and Technicians (NABET-CWA) features a key job security agreement and boosts wages for some 2,400 employees by 12 percent over the contract term.

The union, an affiliate of the 700,000-member Communications Workers of America, now is preparing contract explanation materials for local membership meetings prior to a mail-ballot referendum to be completed by April 19, 2002, reported NABET-CWA President John Clark. Terms of the contract will be retroactive to April 1 if approved by union members.

The most contentious issue in the talks surrounded NBC's insistence on allowing non-represented personnel to gather news footage with hand-held digital cameras in the field, said Clark. "The company took the position from the outset of negotiations that language in the current contract already gave them the right to have non-NABET people handle digital cameras," said Clark. "Although the union disagreed with that position, we would have to address the proposal in some way. We were able to limit the use of cameras by non-NABET people and to win a no-layoff agreement to protect the jobs of our news field engineers. Three quarters of committee members believe that this is the best possible deal we could achieve."

The agreement provides for general wage increases of 3 percent for each of the four years, effective April 1, and improves compensation for daily hires in several areas. It covers broadcast employees throughout the NBC broadcast network as well as at NBC's owned and operated stations.

The parties began a series of limited issue, off-the-record discussions last August which paved the way for an accord more than two weeks prior to the contract expiration date, March 31. The new pact is set to run from April 1, 2002 to March 31, 2006.


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