Le Figaro Lyon
Grégory Doucet wants to keep Euronews journalists in Lyon. In a letter dated May 11 and addressed to the management of the European channel housed in the famous green cube of the Confluence, the ecologist mayor of Lyon denounces the announced elimination of 197 positions within the Lyon headquarters, including 123 among the editorial staff. Like his counterpart in the metropolis, Bruno Bernard, last month, the mayor expresses "his deep disagreement with a massive redundancy plan". Euronews, recognised as being of general European interest in 2010, announced a "redeployment plan" which provides for the creation of 120 journalist posts in the main European capitals, including 70 in Brussels. Undermined by debt, the chain installed in Ecully at its creation in 1993 before moving to the Confluence in 2015, will also sell its emblematic headquarters.
"I ask you to reconsider your decision in order to find sustainable alternatives to maintain these jobs," wrote Grégory Doucet to the management of the chain now 88% owned by a Portuguese investment fund. The mayor of Lyon says he is "deeply concerned about the social and economic repercussions of these layoffs on employees and their families". The mayor also anticipates "negative consequences on the quality and impartiality of the information that journalists have always demonstrated".
At the beginning of February, worried about their future, a hundred employees went on strike and demonstrated in Lyon, in front of the company's headquarters. The management then evoked "an ambitious plan of conquest, in no case a retirement or a stunting of the company".