Six French-language newspapers going digital-only, cutting nearly 100 jobs

A selection of newspapers are pictured in Montreal. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Paul Chiasson

The Coops de l'information (CN2i) said Wednesday it will stop printing weekly editions of six newspapers at the end of the year and cut about 100 positions, or about a third of its workforce.

The newspapers Le Droit, Le Soleil, La Tribune, Le Nouvelliste, La Voix de l'Est and Le Quotidien, which had kept a paper edition on Saturdays, will cease to be printed at the end of December, the company confirmed in a text published on the website of its different publications.

In the process, about 100 positions could be eliminated out of about 350 employees. The cooperative hopes that voluntary departures will avoid layoffs, however, the paper-related employees will be affected.

The union side says management has not yet given a specific plan, but there is an openness to find the best way to ensure CN2i's survival with the least negative impact on employees, says Annick Charette, president of the CSN's National Federation of Communications and Culture, in an interview. The atmosphere is not confrontational.

The abolition of positions has indirectly already begun, since the co-op recently decreed a hiring freeze, Charette added.

It was not possible to get an immediate reaction from management. Geneviève Rossier, executive director of the Coops de l'information, told the Journal de Montréal that a voluntary departure program would be put in place starting in June. Rossier, who took up her post in March, was previously head of the French-language service of The Canadian Press.

The six dailies will be entirely distributed on digital platforms. The cooperative is planning a new web interface for its sites as well as new applications.

The publications had already begun a partial abandonment of paper when they stopped publishing their paper editions from Monday to Friday in March 2020.

It's a tough environment for print newspapers. Printing costs are under inflationary pressure at the same time that a portion of their advertising revenues have migrated to web giants like Facebook and Google.

Last December, the Journal de Québec and the Journal de Montréal announced that they would stop printing their Sunday editions at the beginning of 2023.

In October, Postmedia stopped printing the Monday editions of nine of its publications, including the Montreal Gazette.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published in French on March 29, 2023.