The Writers Guild of America West says new NBCUniversal owner Comcast (Nasdaq: CMCSA) is "not interested in maintaining Hollywood's union environment" and favors "the same kind of foot-dragging, strong-arm tactics and deceit they've deployed against every effort to unionize elsewhere."
In a "call for support" to its members, WGAW directors Chip Jahannessen and Patric Verone maintained that Comcast even included its anti-union stance in a training manual that says, "Comcast does not feel union representation is in the best interests of its employees, customers or shareholders."
Comcast's Entertainment Group writers have voted to unionize with WGAW--which represents NBC's writers--but "Comcast thinks it can pull a sleight of hand, labeling some of its writers 'Comcast' and so non-union, when across the hall there is NBC. That may be the way they built the cable company with the worst customer satisfaction ratings in America, but we can't let it be the way they behave here," the union statement said.
For more:
- see this Writers Guild statement
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