McGuire axes 100 Nine news jobs - accidentally sacks himself

THE AGE - Up to 100 people will be made redundant by the Nine Network as part of a revamp of its news and current affairs coverage.

Nine chief Eddie McGuire announced the voluntary redundancies at a strategic meeting with network staff in Sydney today.

"It's all on paper now so unfortunately all the people on this list are going to have to leave the company to allow us to grow... rich."

Mr McGuire said the majority of the redundancies would affect news and current affairs in Sydney. Other people corrected him that it would affect the "reporting of news", not the news itself, which would happen whether a Channel Nine crew was there to film it or not.

"I'd just like to say that the list of employees getting sacked, I mean offered redundancies, were not randomly picked from a Channel Nine staff listing as people have mentioned. All the names on here are surplus and will need to find other employment."

When asked where the person on the list called "E. McGuire" worked, Eddie looked askanse and said, "Shit. Don't know. But I want him escorted off the premises as soon as possible. Just like the others."

When it was pointed out that only one "E. McGuire" worked at Channel Nine and that was him, Mr McGuire looked rather nervous, put it down to a clerical error before being escorted out the door by several other senior executives (pictured) who had always wondered why they had been overlooked for the head role in the first place. In the words of one executive:

"At least now he's been sacked as General Manager he may have time to host Who Wants to be a Millionaire again. And that's probably the best place for him on the network."