In both a reactionary and precautionary response to an increasingly slumping ad market and to the integration of more than a dozen stations and services over the past three years, which has increased its workforce by 40%, CTV has eliminated 150 positions, laying off roughly 125 employees. About 25 positions were already vacant due to a hiring freeze imposed this summer.

With such purchases as NetStar, CKY Winnipeg and CFCF Montreal, and the launch of seven new digital channels this fall, CTV’s staff has grown by 1,000 to 3,500 over the past three years. ‘We never really took a forensic look at the situation, at the overlapping and duplication. At the areas we could cut back on,’ says CTV president and COO Trina McQueen. ‘We didn’t move the NetStar people in with CTV until this summer and we’re still not finished. The ability to have our people in one single location also [spurred the restructuring].’

This is the first strategic review of CTV’s operations in two years.

Most of the cuts were made in the administrative areas of marketing, promotion, technical and management services, including some senior management positions in the Northern regions.

The idea is to centralize some of the administration and ‘the ambition is to protect programming,’ says McQueen.

While most on-air services remain intact, in Northern Ontario (MCTV), local newscasts for Sudbury, North Bay, Timmins and Sault Ste. Marie have been centralized into a fully regional newscast, with local clips, anchored in Sudbury.

Canada AM will be moved from BCTV, which was sold to Global, to CTV BC, replacing its current breakfast show.

‘It’s a difficult time ahead,’ says McQueen. ‘Some of this is [reactionary] and some of it is definitely precautionary.’

-www.ctv.ca