Is this even legal? Ten’s staff scratching their heads over ‘buyout’ offer

November 6, 2026 — 5:00am

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This week in On Background, Network Ten’s Trumpian buyout offers; the ABC flexes its muscle; News24 presenter’s entertaining prediction; News Corp’s Australian unit in the red again.

When massive mergers happen, staff are often left wondering if they’ll have a job when all is said and done. That was the case last week when an email titled “Building a winning culture” landed in the inboxes of employees of Network Ten, filled with American corporate gobbledegook about buyouts, “one-time offers” and “in-person collaboration” asking if they wanted to leave the company now titled Skydance.

Skydance is owned by David Ellison, who after buying Ten’s owner Paramount last year, completed a deal for HBO and CNN owner Warner Bros Discovery last month.

But just a week after the Trumpian “one-time offer” buyout to all the company’s global staff, which appears squarely aimed at reducing headcount under the guise of offering staff a way out if they don’t want to return to the office five days a week, the Australian media union reckons the company could be in breach of local employment laws.

And staff across Ten have been left scratching their heads as to what exactly the offer is, given details are scant and the fact it was an open offer to any employee to apply to take up.

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While the Media, Entertainment and Arts Alliance tried to clear this up with Skydance, the company insisted it is definitively not a redundancy round, despite offering “personalised details and terms, and a window to decide whether to accept this one-time offer”. Sounds a lot like a voluntary redundancy!

Clearing things up to On Background, the union says the company is unwilling to meet its obligations and is making a blatant attempt to undermine its workers’ rights.

“Union members at Ten have fought for years to secure fair redundancy entitlements for circumstances exactly like these. If Skydance needs to reduce........

© The Sydney Morning Herald