“Cops at Canard ! », repeats Alain Guédé, author of major surveys in chained duckto signify what it represents in the history of this “itchy hair of powers” since 1916. The first police officers to enter in 1973 were bogus plumbers from the Territorial Surveillance Department (DST), who came to put microphones and were surprised by André Escaro, this cartoonist whose wife is now suspected of having held a fictitious job.
Since this summer, an investigator from the judicial police, recently seconded, has been hearing the members of the editorial staff, as part of a preliminary investigation for abuse and concealment of corporate assets. A drafting, deplores Alain Guédé, who now lives under “the sword of Damocles of searches, tapping or examination of telephone fadettes, which obliges him to strengthen the protection of his sources”. And who wonders about her new battles, divided but largely convinced that we must operate differently to prepare for the future.
“A wealthy newspaper managed in a stingy way”
What led a journalist from chained duck to file a complaint against X with the police, rather than seize the labor inspectorate or organize a collective action as a union delegate? Christophe Noble tried to talk to the two heads of the newspaper about it (Michel Gaillard, Chairman, and Nicolas Brimo, Managing Director). But our management only sees bilateral relationships and its relationship to money is complicated. People are paid very differently. It creates discomfort. It is a very wealthy newspaper managed in a stingy way! », loose one of the 18 journalists of the CGT-SNJ union section, created at the end of 2021.
Money, a problem? An enigma for this title sitting on a “war chest” of 130 million euros. This reserve fund, formed after the attempted takeover by Hachette in the 1950s, is now equivalent to seven turnovers. “The bolts were tightened by Michel Gaillard and Nicolas Brimo” in the 1990s, assures Alain Guédé, who arrived in 1981, where “accounting was still bohemian”in a newspaper “which has always been under-equipped at the administrative level ». If there had been a human resources department to manage the fifty employees and the hundred freelancers, the assembly under investigation would not have existed or survived, believes a union member, supporter of untying the purse strings to hire, invest, better pay freelancers. And, for that, to change direction.
The transmission is redesigned
“Things won’t get better if Gaillard and Brimo leave with tar and feathers! an administrator gets annoyed. The newspaper owes them a lot. They want to transfer it in good working order, and the Presstalis messaging bankruptcy filing and the health crisis have not helped. It is a house where the changes are not brutal, where the handover is done gradually. » Michel Gaillard, 78, arrived as a student in 1966 at Canard, and the cartoonist André Escaro, 94, who piloted the title with Roger Fressoz and will remain administrator until 1996, knew the widow Maréchal and her nieces, who sold their shares to the newspaper, notes the journalist. As if this seniority conferred a moral duty to transfer a history, a corporate culture, and this particular satirical tone.
The transmission nevertheless takes shape. The name of the next director is found. Bruno Dive, 61, from South West, will take control of page 2, the famous “duck pond”, which Michel Gaillard was in charge of. The writing has become a bit younger and more feminized. It’s not going fast enough for that other great pen of the Canard who believes that “the newspaper is less good, has no perspective”. There is, he continues, “a problem of values, content, personnel. There are not enough skills, replacements. No one is on the web. Our two leaders are 72 and 78 years old, and half of the editorial staff are over 60 years old. We need young people and train them in culture: a light, amused, distanced tone, which is understanding by all, to decipher the major current issues”.
Five workshops to rethink the newspaper
Already before the health crisis, the idea of a seminar had germinated. It will finally take the form of five workshops. The one on digital has started since the summer. Others will begin at the end of the month on “recruitment”, “new subjects”, “drawings”, and even “the identity of the newspaper”. “We have to ask ourselves what are our fights today”, insists this journalist who finds the newspaper rather classified on the left “sometimes macron-compatible”. The environment, the suburbs, the Gafam, or even domestic violence are all subjects that most would like to see more covered.
Management and editorial staff share the same conviction that the newspaper has its place in the media landscape, but that it needs to be given a “new breath”. ” The hardestsays a supervisor, will be to reconcile, and find again this family spirit where we say things to each other while having lunch on Monday or by finishing the newspaper together at the printing press. » Habits that have been lost.
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Only five directors in a hundred and seven years
Founded for the first time (for five issues) in 1915, then relaunched in 1916by Jeanne and Maurice Maréchal, The chained Duck (281,000 copies, including 17,000 digital) is the oldest satirical press title. In one hundred and seven years, this “newspaper of journalists” had as captains the Marshals, Ernest Raynaud, Roger Fressoz and Michel Gaillard. His model changed little, and he never accepted publicity or press aid. For a long time, the “volatile” – as General de Gaulle nicknamed him – was the only one to publish his annual accounts in the newspaper. Apart from 2020, they have been flourishing, despite a price that remained at €1.20 for thirty years, rising to €1.50 in 2021.