News Broadcasting
Reuters CEO reaps bonanza; employees face benefit cuts: Guild
MUMBAI: The hefty cash bonus that the revenue-losing media outlet Reuters lavished on CEO Tom Glocer last year is greater than the value of cuts in health care and retirement benefits it wants from its unionised US employees. This statement was put out by the Newspaper Guild of New York.
The London-based global news and information company’s recently issued annual report shows that Glocer received a cash bonus of $2.3 million last year. This marked a 52 per cent rise in his 2003 bonus. The company’s main US operating subsidiary, Reuters America is seeking some $1.6 million in concessions from Guild-represented employees in the form of a pay-more-for-less health care plan and reduced company pension
contributions, the Guild said. The company already has imposed similar cuts on nonunion employees.
The Guild goes on to note that despite presiding over a three-year slide in company revenues, Glocer collected more than $10.5 million last year, including nearly $4.5 million in cash, up 22 per cent from 2003, and stock and options tied to company performance targets that are now worth more than $6 million. Two other Reuters top executives, David Grigson and Devin Wenig got cash compensation raises of 11 per cent and 12.6 per cent, respectively.
Glocer’s response to the company’s hardships has been to sell assets, cut worker compensation and eliminate at least 3,000 jobs over three years. New York Guild President Barry Lipton says, “Glocer’s quick-fix tactics may have boosted the company’s stock and made him richer but he’s dead wrong if he expects it to lead to sustainable growth. Reuters is a service company whose success depends on the initiative of its employees. You can’t
give them less and still expect the same quantity and quality of work.”
Shareholders will now have a chance to vote to approve or disapprove Reuters’executive compensation policy at the company’s annual shareholders meeting on 21 April. Guild members, without a contract for two years, voted 301-4 last month to authorise union leaders to call a strike, if necessary.
News Broadcasting
News TV viewership jumps 33 per cent as West Asia war draws audiences
BARC Week 8 data shows news share rising to 8 per cent despite T20 World Cup
NEW DELHI:Â Even as individual television news channel ratings remain under a temporary pause, the genre itself is seeing a clear surge in audience attention.
According to the latest data from Broadcast Audience Research Council India, television news recorded a 33 per cent jump in genre share in Week 8 of 2026, covering February 28 to March 6.
The news genre accounted for 8 per cent of total television viewership during the week, up from 6 per cent the previous week. The spike in attention coincided with escalating geopolitical tensions involving the United States, Israel and Iran, which have kept global headlines firmly fixed on West Asia.
The rise is notable because it came at a time when cricket was dominating television screens. The high-stakes stages of the ICC Men’s T20 World Cup, including the Super 8 fixtures and semi-finals, were being broadcast during the same period.
Despite the cricket frenzy, viewers appeared to be toggling between sport and global affairs, boosting the overall share of news programming.
The surge in genre share comes even as the government has enforced a one-month pause on publishing ratings for individual news channels. The move followed regulatory scrutiny of the television ratings ecosystem.
While channel-level rankings remain temporarily out of sight, the genre-level data suggests that when global tensions escalate, audiences continue to turn to television news for real-time updates.
