° Photo of some crew members from Sooke Logging Division was taken in 1991, after the company axed their bargaining unit jobs. Left to right are Steve Forslund, Hans Szepat, Jim Russell and Guy Scott. Duncan local beats back Pacific Forest Product's attempts to abolish union logging certification The union’s constant battle over contracting out in British Columbia has not stopped since the 1986 strike in the province. Despite that dispute, which lasted 4 1/2 months, the union has been faced with numerous attacks on its bargaining units. No local union realizes that more than IWA-CANADA Local 1-80. Since late 1990 it has been embroiled in a case against Canadian Pacific Forest Products (now known as Pacific For- est Products), where the company has shut down its logging and forestry op- erations at Sooke and has tried to freeze its traditional company employ- ees not only out of a job but out of © province wide contract talks as well. Fortunately the union recently won a case at the provincial Labour Rela- tions Board which merged four certifi- cations at Pacific Forest Products, on southern Vancouver Island, into one master bargaining unit. The decision, made by LRB Vice- Chair Emily Burke on September 12, during a crucial phase in IWA-Forest Industry talks, forced Pacific’s Sooke operations back into master contract negotiations. Previous to the decision the company refused to include the operation in association bargaining with employer representative Forest Industrial Relations, even though its Cowichan logging operation was at the bargaining table with the employ- er association. The company’s actions were seen as a snub at both the contracting out protection language that the union had fought for and a dastardly trick designed to break up association bar- gaining. es The LRB decision, according to lo- cal president Bill Routley, upholds the position that “they’re all in or they’re all out” of the bargaining unit. In 1990 then Canadian Pacific For- est Products laid off its logging and forestry crews at its Sooke logging di- vision, putting the last of its 25 com- pany employees out of work. Under the laws of the Industrial Relations Act (the infamous Bill 19 of the So- cred government of the day) CPFP shut down the company crew and planned to wait out the shutdown for a two year period, then decertify the operation. In the meantime they would award.all work to one of its contractors, Munn’s logging. There had been company loggers on CPFP’s lands since the 1950’s. Those lands consist largely of the old E&N land grants, which are private forest lands on the southern and east- em portion of Vancouver Island. In 1988 the company reduced the crew from 100 down to 25 and gave assurances of long-term employment stability to its company employees. Less than two years later they would all be out of work. “They (the company) originally told the crew that they were downsizing in order to work into the next century with a new reduced crew,” say Broth- er Routley. “Then they decided to empty out the certification by com- pletely shutting out their company employees.” Had they succeeded, says Brother Routley, the company would have ef- fectively found a back door to con- tract out all the work done by the company crew. “Those people in the CPFP crew (Sooke Logging) were very much a part of the 1986 strike”, says the local union president. “They fought along with the rest of the union to stop the erosion of the bargaining unit work and company work to contractors.” Had Pacific Forest Products and its predecessor been successful, it would have set a pattern in place that would have allowed other companies to use the same avenue: shut down opera- tions, wait out time limits, and then _ freely contract out. After June 15, 1994 and before the LRB decision, umpire Vince Ready, under terms of the collective agree- ment, ruled that forestry, logging, loading, and trucking work happening in the Sooke division should be the work of unionized company crews. That ruling went along way to pro- tecting the bargaining units. Ready also previously ruled that the union contractor in the Sooke divi- sion, Munn’s logging, should not get more than its traditional portion of the annual allowable cut. Routley says the IWA was not fight- ing to take work away from contrac- tors, but it “was an issue of what is right and fair under the circumstances when you've got a company that owns the lands.” 4 By merging all of the Pacific Forest Products certifications together, there will be more job security for the workers and when the company ex- pands its cut, those jobs will go to bargaining unit employees. In the Sooke area, there is an esti- mated 1.5 to 2 million cubic meters of old growth forests, and a large area of second growth in various age classes. The local is now aware that the company wants to expand its produc- tion in the Sooke area by around 50,000 cubic meters annually. Now it will have to log it with parent compa- ny crews. x The former.union members from the Sooke division have had their se- niority protection long run out. Now they can get back to work only via preferential hiring provisions. In 1990 they were not even offered severance pay. “Tt was the first time in the history of the local union where a company never even wanted to discuss the is- sue of severance pay, after shutting down such a large operation. “In 1990 the people at Sooke were cut off and left to hang by the compa- ny,” comments Routley. “I wish we could fix up the past for those who got screwed around. We have done what we could.” The newly merged company bar- gaining unit takes in the following for- mer divisions: Cowichan logging division, Cowichan forestry division, Sooke logging division, and Sooke forestry division. But Brother Routley thinks the LRB decision will not be the end of the lo- cal’s problems with the company. “We're hoping that Pacific Forest Products will live up to the LRB deci- sion,” says Routley. “However, given their track record, we can probably expect some more slippery moves from them.” Editors note - It has just been learned that Pacific has applied to the Labour Relations Board for reconsid- eration of the decision. Local 2693 Continued from page eight The workers didn’t join the union until only a few years ago because of the usual fear that they might lose their jobs during the times of high un- employment, says business agent and union recording secretary Joe Hanlon, who services the plant. In 1991 the company asked the workers to take a rollback in wages and overtime. It was at this time that they decided to talk to the union _about organizing. Shortly thereafter _ they were in the IWA. The union put a top to any talk of concessions and “some wage increases. In the first the parts clerks got over a fr. wage increase. addition to doing repair work on Timberjack line of equipment r bunchers, skidders, loaders, the unionized mechanics work irs of other logging equipment. sells and nates ie Heer ic roadside chippers. They ‘on Lokomo and John Deere A lot of their work out in the bush are routine maintenance jobs. Whether or not maintenance or warranty workers are unionized or not, the Local union has a policy that they must be accompanied by an IWA mechanic when they go into an IWA operation (i.e. Canadian Pacific For- est Products, Abitibi, etc.). “Tf they are on company limits they (service and warranty mechanics) have to have an IWA mechanic with them at all times,” says Brother Han- lon. This policy has been put in place to prevent contracting out of union jobs. Since the Timberjack mechanics are in the IWA, they get a special wel- come says Brother Hanlon, himself a former truck driver and mechanic. Don Lamore, a mechanic and local union member, says the company is good for upgrading its people on new technical matters in relating to equip- ment, It will send the workers out to courses on technology on new equip- ment. s But still the company is stingy on travel time to remote locations. Continued on page eleven e At the MNT Builders operation, worker puts the sander to a piece of softwood trim. LUMBERWORKER/NOVEMBER, 1994/9