A Fairfax journalist wears a shirt displaying a slogan during a protest regarding the announcement of further staff cuts to the Sydney Morning Herald (SMH) and Melbourne Age newspapers in central Sydney, Australia, May 4, 2017. REUTERS/David Gray
SYDNEY (Reuters) - More than 100 journalists at Australia's oldest publisher, Fairfax Media, protested outside the company's offices on Thursday at the start of a rare week-long strike in opposition to a decision to axe a quarter of its editorial staff.
Fairfax is shedding 125 jobs at its Australian newspapers as part of the latest cuts, which the company said was needed to restore its financial well-being amid falling print readership numbers and the leaking of advertising dollars to digital rivals such as Alphabet Inc's Google and Facebook Inc. Journalists wearing black T-shirts bearing "Fair go, Fairfax" stood outside the company's Australian offices, while other employees protested outside a Sydney hotel where Fairfax's Chief Executive Greg Hywood defended the job cuts at an industry conference. Hywood said editions of Australia's oldest continuously printed newspapers would continue even though the strike is expected to see many of Fairfax's most experienced journalists absent for Australia's federal budget, a centrepiece event of Australian media companies.
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