Seven weeks into their strike, unionized staffers on the Writers Guild of America West will lose their health care advantages on Wednesday.
WGA West staffers may be covered by the Producer-Writers Guild of America (PWGA) Health Plan, the identical plan that is obtainable to the Hollywood union’s members. Staffers accrue coverage on a month-to-month basis so long as they work 31 hours per week the previous month.
Staffers unionized with the Writers Guild Staff Union (WGSU), who’ve been out on strike since Feb. 17, say they learned on Tuesday that they may lose eligibility starting Wednesday.
Missy Brown, the co-chair of the WGSU, said in an interview that union members didn’t learn until Tuesday afternoon concerning the lack of coverage, and that was only after she found a PWGA Health Plan staffer who would speak together with her. “I just find this very crazy that we weren’t notified of this,” she says.
Brown said that she left repeated voicemails with multiple staffers on the PWGA Health Plan offices over the previous couple of days to find out the long run of striking members’ coverage. She eventually “begged a receptionist to please find me a human being” on the offices and the staffer she was connected with then informed her that she and other striking guild members shall be losing coverage April 1.
The WGA West confirmed the lack of coverage on Tuesday. “Striking employees can elect COBRA continuation coverage in the event that they want to be covered by the PWGA Health Fund in April. The WGAW cannot contribute on behalf of staff employees who didn’t work in March and don’t have any earnings,” the union said in a press release.
Along with the alleged lack of communication around their lack of coverage, WGSU members are lamenting that their employer has not tried to rectify the situation. In an Instagram post, the union stated that “through the 2023 writers strike, WGAW and AMPTP negotiated to increase health coverage for writers throughout the strike.”
There was no such extension for striking WGSU members, though they’re in a unique position than the writers in 2023 — the PWGA Health Plan is jointly administered by studio and union leaders and staffers are only negotiating with the union side. The WGA West negotiated its health coverage extension as a part of its strike settlement agreement, relatively than mid-strike.
Contends Brown, ”I’m sure there was something that would have been worked out to retain our healthcare.”
The most recent dispute marks an escalation of already-high tensions between the WGSU and the WGA West. For weeks the staff union has been picketing outside the constructing where WGA West negotiators are locked in high-stakes negotiations with studios and streamers. A video published by Variety on March 27 showed protestors chanting “shame!” as WGA West negotiating committee members and leaders entered the constructing for negotiations.
Meanwhile, the WGA West and the WGSU remain at loggerheads over key elements of the union’s first contract. The 2 sides are stuck on issues just like the role of seniority in layoffs and a wage scale for union members.