BBC journalists and technical workers have agreed to strike in protest at proposed job cuts at the British public service broadcaster.
Members of the National Union of Journalists, BECTU and Amicus trade unions are planning a one-day strike on May 23rd, a second strike over 48 hours on May 31st and June 1st. A fourth strike was also authorised, but a date has yet to be set.
Popular breakfast programmes and nightly news broadcasts are likely to be affected, but the BBC has not yet finalised its TV and radio schedules for the strike days.
Union members voted yesterday to strike in protest at the broadcaster's plans to cut about 20 per cent of its workforce, the equivalent of about 4,000 jobs, under Director General Mark Thompson.
"We have absolutely no doubt that BBC staff will act with their feet and walk out in huge numbers, causing major disruption to programme output," NUJ general secretary Jeremy Dear said.
The unions said they would call off the strike if the BBC granted a 90-day moratorium to the planned staff cuts, guaranteed that any redundancies be voluntary and protected conditions of jobs set to be outsourced.
"These are the opening shots in a campaign to force the BBC to negotiate with the trade unions," said BECTU's lead BBC official Luke Crawley. "We cannot waste time 'consulting', we need to discuss how to stop the cuts."
"By threatening the BBC's output, the unions put at risk the BBC's relationship with the public, which is not in anyone's interest," BBC officials said in a statement.