Surly Independent journalists will gather for an NUJ meeting tomorrow lunchtime with editor Chris Blackhurst and other management types as reporters and subeditors seek further information about the up to 20 job cuts planned for later this year. The grand plan is that there will be closer working between the Independent and Evening Standard, leading to savings at all the titles – except, as one dissatisfied caller complains, "section heads don't even know what is intended". The concern is that change is being pushed through at breakneck speed, and a strike ballot is planned unless Blackhurst et al can somehow perform a miracle. After all, it was only as recently as 2 October that Blackhurst himself denied there were any immediate plans for Independent-Standard integration. At that time he said that although "people keep looking at it", there was "nothing in my in-tray". How things have changed in a month.
