TORONTO – Negotiations between ACTRA and producers broke down last night "after producers tabled an outrageous pay offer and demanded free Internet rights," says a release put out by the actors’ union,
No new negotiations are scheduled and ACTRA is in a strike position in most of Canada starting in January 2007.
The CFTPA has yet to say anything publicly on this new development.
"I very much regret that Canadian producers have decided to provoke a dispute in which they will be the principal victims," said Stephen Waddell, ACTRA’s national executive director and chief negotiator. "But given the conduct of their trade associations, we appear to be a few days away from a major disruption in Canada’s film and television industry."
Canadian stars turned out in force late Wednesday and into Thursday morning to support the negotiating team including Wendy Crewson, Charmion King, Gordon Pinsent, Maria Del Mar, Peter Keleghan, Sarah Polley, Eric Peterson, Maury Chaykin, Peter MacNeill, Peter Outerbridge, Liz Ramos, Jason Blicker, Art Hindle, Michael Murphy, Susan Coyne, Raoul Bhaneja, Jeff Pustil and Rino Romano, says the ACTRA release.
The union says it presented an offer to settle the current contract dispute, including addingflexibility in the use of performances on the Internet, wage concessions for low-budget independent Canadian producers, and morfe flexible rules for ‘reality’ television
"These are the issues producers told us they cared about and wanted to see addressed," Waddell said. "In return we asked for a fair and reasonable pay settlement."
In return, producers offered a pay proposal that included a 0%, 0% and 1% offer on Canadian productions, and held to contract demands that amount to demanding work from Canadian performers on the internet for free, says ACTRA.
Waddell said ACTRA will begin a set of announcements regarding any strike action it will take.
