Reach PLC's journalist union members have expressed alarms about the use of AI in the company after the CEO announced plans to “accelerate” it.
Last week, he reached Boss Piers North and promoted the use of AI as one of three important priorities in what he praised as a “new chapter” of the business.
However, the national coalition of journalists fears that the technology is being used to “mitigate” the losses of hundreds of journalists whose jobs have disappeared due to recent cuts.
The company recently announced an overhaul of sports coverage. This is expected to lead to 30-50 redundancy across national and local titles.
The motion passed by NUJ Group Chapel stated: “This group chapel has noticed that the CEO is talking about the need to accelerate the use of AI in business in the same week that major redundancy has been proposed across sports teams.
“As experience, the only way a company can fill its tough audience targets with a thread-bear workforce is to use generative AI to compensate for the decline in personnel.
“This is unacceptable and poses a significant risk to Leach's journalistic reputation and integrity, and as a result, it also poses risk for hundreds of journalists.
“While Group Chapels are not opposed to the use of AI in the newsroom as a rule, the way generative AI is used to mitigate the lost power of hundreds of journalists is incompatible with the company's stated purpose of providing value to its audience.”
The Chapel is currently seeking consultations with the company to consider ways in which AI can be used “productively but fairly” in the newsroom.
Piers in the photo set his own thoughts on the use of technology and AI in a presentation to investors after he announced the group's six-month results on Thursday.
He said: “From a market situation perspective, I don't think we can have a serious conversation about the media or business without talking about AI.
“We have been developing and using our own editing AI tool, Guten for over two years. We deploy this tool in all newsrooms, supporting the creation of about a quarter to a third of the articles we publish.
“I warn you that we will continue to see this as a journalist's tool. It's important to understand that humans are constantly connected to the content we publish, and that's not the machines out there.
“But that's an important part of the future and now I've done that early work in commercial editing, so there's a great opportunity for the wider business.”
