Two CBC foreign correspondents’ contracts not renewed

The CBC has confirmed that it has not renewed employment contracts for two veteran foreign correspondents, Patrick Brown and Don Murray, according to a report in The Globe and Mail.

The two correspondents, Brown in Beijing and Murray in London, had been working under part-time contracts that were renewed yearly. But not this year. CBC spokesperson Jeff Keay said the broadcaster hopes to continue working with both the longtime reporters, but he confirmed the contracts had not been renewed.

Former CBC News editor-in-chief Tony Burman (currently managing director of Al-Jazeera’s English-language news service) commented by email for the Globe story, saying the CBC’s rationale is “to save money, even though the salaries of
both total less than $200,000 a year, a fraction of CBC News’s
$170-million budget.” He added:

“I think it’s shameful that two of the CBC’s most distinguished foreign
correspondents would be treated this way.”