‘Bad Day For Good Journalism’: openDemocracy Funding Collapse Triggers UK Newsroom Job Cuts
Unionised openDemocracy staff expressed a loss of confidence in CEO Satbir Singh and Board Chair Suzanna Taverne. (Screengrab via openDemocracy/YouTube)
Non-profit news outlet Open Democracy said it would have been “insolvent by June” if it had not slashed its budget by 40 percent in a move that led to ten unexpected job cuts on its UK team in March.
This dire financial position was disclosed in an email from the leadership to the National Union of Journalists (NUJ), reported on by Press Gazette, after unionised staff passed a vote of no confidence in CEO Satbir Singh and Board Chair Suzanna Taverne.
The publisher, which showed a £110,000 surplus in its 2022 annual report, claims it found itself on shaky ground with a failure to renew critical funding agreements and the impact of global economic pressures. In response, the non-profit conducted a drastic reduction in workforce, costing roughly a third of its journalists as well as some senior editorial staff.
Head of News Ramzy Alwakeel was among those laid off by the organisation and called it a “dark day” for “British journalism”:
Editor Sam Gelder wrote:
The backdrop is a broader organisational instability, marked by frequent leadership changes and a high turnover in fundraising and finance roles. This turbulence culminated in legal disputes involving former CEO Peter Geoghegan, who told Press Gazette he was now in “legal correspondence” with the board and his successor, Singh, over how these funding issues emerged so suddenly.
According to Press Gazette, the organisation told the NUJ: “Some major funders have undertaken strategic reviews and changed their priorities. Others have their own financial challenges with higher costs due to inflation and worsening endowments; the rebuilding of some neglected relationships is slow and, in a climate of uncertainty with major elections forthcoming, many funders are deferring decisions.”
Despite Open Democracy’s previous funding successes, including substantial grants for investigative journalism, the organisation now faces a constrained funding environment. Recent strategic shifts by major funders like the Open Society Foundations, which are pulling back on European projects, have left Open Democracy and similar organisations in a more precarious position.
As Open Democracy reassures that necessary funds have been secured to meet redundancy terms, the real challenge remains in continuing to sustain journalism that impacts while navigating the volatile nature of non-profit funding.
