DNEG London allegedly announce 200 redundancies in company-wide meeting today

According to a post on the r/vfx reddit channel, DNEG have allegedly informed their employees around 200 people from various departments will be receiving news later today (09/06/2020) that they will made redundant. The post from the reddit post reads:

“Throwaway this time, just in case. Just been informed in a company-wide meeting that around 200 people from various departments will be receiving news later today that they will be made redundant. Comes as the deadline for the furlough scheme end tomorrow (Wednesday 11th June). Despite people being made to take pay cuts as a way to prevent job losses, it seems that DNEG has decided to move forward with these redundancies. Terrible news to hear when people were outright told that due to pay cuts, redundancies would be kept to a minimum. Hopefully, everyone affected by these layoffs stays safe and manages to find work elsewhere in the coming months”

— anon

This is developing news and we will report as and when we find out more information on the matter. Though, the news has already been confirmed by a number of our AVU members.

Any staff affected are urged to get in touch with the AVU if you are worried or need consultation on where you stand. Consider joining today and help make our industry a safer and fairer place to be.

Your AVU

URGENT - Text of a proposed Collective Grievance to be adopted by workers at DNEG, London

This document was created by DNEG employees in consultation with BECTU officials. The text of the Collective Grievance that will be send to DNEG Management will be as follows:

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To DNEG HR Department.

We, the undersigned, wish to lodge a collective grievance about the way in which DNEG are consulting staff about the proposed pay cuts. We understand that this is a very challenging time for the company, and to be completely clear, we are not, and will not, ask the company to do anything that will result in job-losses.

We do not accept that asking for a longer and meaningful consultation will do anything to damage the company’s trading position or its capacity to preserve jobs as the company has already proposed retrospective pay cuts at one point during this consultation.

In return for an agreement to consult with us according to the terms set out below, we will agree that any changes agreed by that meaningful consultation can be backdated to the date currently proposed by the company. Indeed, the company will have our support for any reasonable changes to the employment contract if they can be shown to retain staff at current levels.

Individuals have already been told that it is likely that this wage-cut consultation may soon also be followed by job-cuts and a reduction to the headcount at DNEG. We believe that we should not conclude any consultation about wage cuts until we have also had a meaningful consultation about job-losses that are likely to follow in the short-medium term.

We believe that, if any jobs are lost in the near future, should also be done fairly as part of a redundancy process with a full consultation and that people with less than two years of service should be treated in the same way as everybody else.

We do not believe that it is fair to treat people working on Fixed Term Contracts in the same way as people on permanent contracts who will have their jobs preserved by these cuts, and we believe that these people should be treated differently. These people have less of a stake in ‘saving jobs at DNEG’ and it is unfair to ask them to take the same cuts as everybody else.

This brings us to the substance of our grievance.
We object to the speed that this consultation is being done in. The company has still not shared all of the details of the current proposal with the staff and we are still hearing rumours about an ‘equity pool’ among other things, yet the consultation period end-date is imminent.

We are asking the company to halt the current consultation and re-start it as a meaningful collective consultation that is done to an agreed and reasonable time-scale. We do not accept the proposed changes, and if the company refuses to offer a meaningful consultation, we will be forced to either work under the new terms under protest while exploring all legal means at our disposal to compel the company into a meaningful collective consultation, or resign our positions. Individuals who are party to this collective grievance may take a different position on this question.

Our understanding of a meaningful collective consultation is as follows:·      

• Staff should be invited to elect a representative group of representatives from among the staff who can meet privately and negotiate collectively.·      

• It is important that we can verify the company’s claims about its trading position and prospects, along with the claims about the reasons that these changes are being sought.·      

• These staff should be given privileged access, under terms of confidentiality, to the details of the company’s finances, trading position, along with the forecasts that DNEG are basing their projections on.

The reps elected in a collective consultation should be able to appoint independent advisors of our choice. They should be able to work under similar terms of confidentiality to advise us on the company’s understanding of its trading position. It is important that all staff can reassure themselves that these wage-cuts are being proposed for the reason that the company is giving to staff.

It is also important that the balance of risk is being shared fairly between staff and shareholders, but also fairly among staff with different kinds of staff being treated fairly. At the moment, we are not clear that this is the case.

The group of representatives should be elected to include a representative group of everyone including people on Fixed Term Contracts, staff who have been furloughed, people with less than two years of service, people who have a long record of service, people who are on part-time or job-share contracts, along with representatives from all departments.

We are asking for this grievance to be conducted according to the company’s handbook, and with reference to ACAS guidance on best practice in cases such as this. Some of us would like to hold this grievance collectively, and some of us may be prepared to have their grievance heard personally. Those of us who wish to have their grievance heard collectively reserve the right to be accompanied by a trade union representative. We will be prepared to do this on a Zoom call if necessary.

We strongly urge the company to agree to this request. It is a very reasonable and minimal response to being unilaterally asked to accept pay-cuts of up to 25% and doing so will help to foster the goodwill that the company is going to need between staff and management going forwards.

Signed by: _____________________________________

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If you work at DNEG London, and you wish to take part in, and support this Collective Grievance, click the button!

vfxAssemble - What Happened

vfxAssemble Wraps

The vfxAssemble campaign finished on 10th November and we’d like to give a big shout out to all those who took part in it. Thanks to all of you out there who believed in it!Also, a very special thanks to everyone in the VFX branch committee, our VFX branch chair Joe Pavlo, and the BECTU Branch rep Paul Evans and everyone else who worked on vfxAssemble for their tireless efforts to make our industry a better place for every one of us.While we didn’t reach 50% membership at any of the four big London VFX facilities: (Double Negative, Framestore, ILM and MPC), hundreds and hundreds of you did believe in a better vfx industry and did sign up for vfxAssemble.

What Have We Achieved?

Because of all of you, vfxAssemble has started conversations and raised awareness and we are now a stronger VFX union than before. The VFX branch of BECTU is now the biggest and most active visual effects union anywhere in the world!Building a movement isn’t easy and it doesn’t happen overnight and it certainly takes a lot of work. We’re hoping that a whole bunch of you that got inspired by the vfxAssemble campaign will join the union now and become active in helping to grow this movement.Even when the progress is in small steps, it’s plain for all to see that what we are doing is moving things forward, changing attitudes and changing our industry for the better. One movement at a time, one campaign at a time, we are creating a space for the VFX union.

Going Forward

What we who have joined the union envisage in the not too distant future is an industry where VFX workers don’t have to lead unsociable and unhealthy lives. Where women working in the industry are not victims of geek sexism and an equal voice and equal pay isn’t left to chance. Where a juniors pay doesn’t average out to below the living wage because of unlimited unpaid overtime. Where film credits are guaranteed for those who work on the visual effects. Where more experienced artists do not have to fear being singled out and blacklisted for wanting a better and fairer industry. Where vfx workers can feel confident that their skills and experience are valued by the London visual effects industry. Where they can all feel that the industry they work for is also working for them.

We Want To Hear From You

The revolutionary vfxAssemble crowdsourcing model for union recruitment has been a huge leap forward for unionisation in our industry. We think the idea that people can pledge to join the union without signing up until enough of their colleagues pledge to join too is a brilliant strategy and we are going to keep working at it and refining it until we are successful. The light bulb is a great idea  In fact, it's become symbolic of all great ideas, but Thomas Edison made a lot of light bulbs that didn't work before he got it right. We're going to keep working at this until we get it right too! Help us make it even better next time around by taking the survey.We don't know how long it will take but full unionisation of visual effects is inevitable. The truth is, in the short time that the VFX union has been active we have seen marked improvements in the workplace and the London VFX industry has never been busier. There’s no need to fear unionisation. We are already making things better and it will be only be a matter of time before VFX workers across London collectively choose to assemble a majority to take our industry to the next level and help make it better and stronger for everyone.Until then, and beyond, it’s never too late to sign up!

Credits – “We need to save the VFX houses from themselves”

This morning, I paid a visit to the HQ of Warner Bros UK to deliver a petition to Warner CEO Kevin Tsujihara challenging major motion picture companies who don't give a film credit to VFX artists that work on their films. You can see a video of this here. Alongside me was a movie star who has left a transformative impression on the modern film industry. You can see him prancing around behind me in the pic (below).At the time of writing, over 6100 people have signed this petition about this issue. The workers that are refused a credit often work 70, 80, even 90 hours a week, and if they’re doing it here in London, they often don’t even get paid overtime for doing so.These workers are essential to the success of the modern motion picture industry – today, every major success is drenched in VFX. It’s an odd situation for them to be in.They don’t get a credit, but almost everyone else does, mainly because every other part of the industry is unionised in one way or another. Hang around until the lights go up at the end next time you’re at the cinema and you will see that the rest of the crew get a credit. The reason that VFX Artists don’t is because this sector isn’t seen as unionised - they work for companies that will give their rights away to win the work.When Warners, and the other big picture companies a firm ask DNeg to jump, DNeg can only ask “how high”? Warners can do this because they know that DNeg will always oblige, worried that they may lose the business otherwise.So when Warners say to D-Neg “we don’t have room at the end of our film to give your people a credit”, D-Neg have little choice but to say “Oh, Ok.”That’s what happened last year on Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them. DNeg had to give the bad news to loads of their VFX people.And why was this even possible? Because Warners know that DNeg’s staff will let this happen. Because the industry isn’t unionised, the big studios know that they can force VFX workers into a ‘race to the bottom’.It’s the same with unpaid overtime. It’s the same with really long hours – counterproductive damaging working days that actually harm the industry and drive great artists out of the business. As long as VFX workers don’t stick together and say no to this, they are forcing their employers to compete with each other by running a race to the bottom.The cost of giving VFX workers a credit would be very low, but this is a much more important issue than it seems at first glance. Here's why.We don’t believe that the London VFX houses really do want to be in a race to the bottom – but as long as they are competing in an industry where the workers are prepared to accept not being given a credit, they have no choice but to compete on that turf. We can change this, and when we do, it won't just be a failure to give a credit that we will challenge. It's the same logic that results in people working unpaid overtime. All of our conversations with BECTU members working in the industry tells us that they want to be in a race to the top. Our members here in London want to compete on quality. They want to work sensible hours – hours that are conducive to producing good work. They want a boss who won’t give their film credit away. By sticking together, VFX workers can save the VFX houses from themselves. That’s why we’re asking anyone who isn’t already in the union to go to vfxAssemble.comIf you do, here’s our offer to you:

• Don’t pay anything now. Just pledge to join the union if we can get 50% of your colleagues here in London to do the same thing,
• If we get to that target, only then will we process your application.

It’s like crowdfunding – like Kickstarter or GoFundMe – you only commit once lots of other people have done so. Like all crowdfunding projects, there is a deadline – two-and-a-half weeks away - 10^th November – so do it now!After that, it’s too late. Give yourself a bit of credit – join vfxAssemble now!

UK VFX Union featured on fxguide podcast!

Paul Evans, the BECTU national official for the vfx branch and Joe Pavlo, the vfx branch chair had a chat with Jeff Heuser from the fxguide podcast to talk about their work in the UK to establish a Visual Effects Union. A lot of ground was covered from the explosive growth of the vfx union in the UK over the last year, to some of the issues facing people working in the visual effects industry and a look ahead at the future of the union in the visual effects industry.listen to the episode here:

fxpodcast #303: UK Union update

We discuss the latest info about UK visual effects artists who are seeking union representation. Joe Pavlo (artist) and Paul Evans (BECTU) are our guests. Unpaid overtime, fear, social media, how to organize, collusion, opting out of overtime... just a few of the things Joe and Paul discuss with our Jeff Heusser

also available to download in iTunes

Inspired? Why not come along to the Thursday VFX LunchMeet every week from 1-2pm in the courtyard at St. Anne's Church, Wardour Street (nr. Shaftesbury Avenue) and find our more about the vfx union - or just cut to the chase and join the union right now!

London VFX house closing shop?

  News has it that Method London is undergoing a huge restructuring which will result in the loss of many jobs during a huge shrinkage. Method currently has around 70 employees, so if true this would be a substantial loss of jobs. Only a few years ago on April 30, 2013 Method gave news on an expansion from a shared existence at its Deluxe Office to a new facility on Meard Street and they were looking forward to a continued growth through 2013.Just over two years later it looks like Method is reversing trends perhaps to refocus on its global operations? Their website also appears to be currently available at this time.This just on the back of Double Negative's announcement last week of its reduction in employees in both London  (40 staff) and Singapore (80 staff) while annoucing the opening of a new Mumbai  expansion in June of this year. Not to mention the contracts that would be up for renewal in its London office, which one can only assume will either not be renewed or will be encouraged to move abroad. To Vancouver, perhaps?If you are a Bectu member and are affected by these changes either at Method or Double Negative, please get into contact with the VFX Bectu representative, Paul Evans, who can be of service to you in this time of London redundancies and closures. Bectu can help clear up any questions you have about UK Laws and make sure you are aware of your employee rights as well as be your advocate in these situations. That's one of the great benefits of being part of the union.If you are not yet in the union, it's not too late join. Join Here