WGA Settles Paramount Merger Lawsuit for 5-Year CBS Layoff Pause, $17.5M Health Fund Contribution

The Writers Guild of America settled its lawsuit against Paramount Skydance opposing the Warner Bros. merger shortly following the settlement between the studio and the 12 state attorneys general that filed their own lawsuit in July. As part of the settlement, Paramount Skydance will pay $17.5 million to the WGA health plan along with the guild’s legal fees and has signed an agreement prohibiting layoffs at CBS News’ broadcast division. “We continue to believe the merger will cause damage to writers and the industry at large. Now that the Attorneys General have settled with Paramount, however, as a nonprofit, the WGA must contend with the reality of forging ahead alone, with no backing from government enforcers, with a complex antitrust lawsuit that would cost millions of dollars to pursue through trial,” the WGA said in a statement. “Though we were not successful in blocking the merger, our advocacy brought more attention to the harms that this merger—and others like it—will cause. We will continue to fight the harms of industry consolidation,” the guild’s statement continued. “As the number of outlets to sell our work to and the corresponding diversity of programming shrinks, we need industry-wide structural separation between streamers and studios in order to promote competition in programming, like the Financial Interest and Syndication Rules once required in broadcast television. We will continue to fight for these goals.” More to come…