i

e Making an appearance at the union’s national convention for the first time in nine years were representa
union president Terry Vickery and executive board member Pat Hogan.

tives from Local 306. Left to right are local

Union renews efforts in New Brunswick

hen New Brunswick

Local 306 officers

Terry Vickery and Pat

Hogan attended last

,.- year’s national con-

Wwention in Wencouver; it was a sym-

- bol of the union’s increasing-activi-
‘ties in that Maritime province.

For nine years there had not been
an I.W.A. delegate from New
Brunswick at a national convention.
Financial constraints wouldn’t allow
it to happen until last September.

With both of its operations in the
city of Miramichi, Local 306 is the
lone I.W.A. presence on Canada’s
east coast. Those operations are the
Nelson Forest Products plywood
mill and the Repap New Brunswick
Inc. stud mill.

Brother Vickery, who is the local
union president, works as a veneer
composer in the plant and Brother
Hogan is a forklift driver. In an
interview with the Lumberworker
during the convention in September
of 1998, they both said that there
has been a marked increase in activ-
ity in the local, in terms of the pres-
ence of national officers, education
in health and safety and organizing
and organizing activity itself.

In June of 1998 both I.W.A.
CANADA National President Dave
Haggard and then National Second
Vice President Fred Miron (now
retired) visited the New Brunswick
local for two days to make the union’s
intentions clear.

Shortly after that visit there was
an occupational health and safety
seminar conducted by National
Safety Director Tom Lowe and
attended by National First Vice

President Neil Menard. Brother
Menard also introduced the union’s
Disability Management/Duty-to-
Accommodate course manual to the
participants.

“When the national president,
vice presidents and safety director
came to see us there was a clear
message, that we are not alone here
on the east coast,” said Brother
Vickery. “Service for our local has
been good in the past, especially in
terms of fighting grievances and
arbitrations, and we think that it
will get even get better in the future.
At the same time there are younger

members on our committees that
have to learn to do more things for
ourselves to build and organize in
the local union.”

During the meeting with the local
umion, Brother Haggard stressed.
the.importance of the I.W.A.’s orga-
nizing and growth strategy and the
commitment to build up the mem-
bership in that province.

“Haggard let us know that if we
grow we will become more self-effi-
cient as a result,” said Brother
Hogan.

“There are places that we missed
(organizing) over the years that
have gone union and they could
have been,” said Vickery.

A month after the convention
National Education Director Lyle
Pona visited New Brunswick to con-
duct an ORG I class in the local
union.

“The course that we gave to the
members in New Brunswick was
done to develop awareness on the
principles of organizing and explain
the diversity of the organizing activ-
ity that is going on today in the
I.W.A.,” said Brother Pona.

ORG I also teaches how to target

unorganized operations and make
contacts.

Pona found that the Local 306
members were keen on organizing.
“They were enthusiastic about orga-
nizing and showed that there is a
potential to make progress in the
province despite some very anti-
union employers,” he added.

ORGANIZERS ATTEMPT NEW DRIVES

In October of last year Mike
Hunter, the union’s organizing co-
ordinator in Eastern Canada, went
to New Brunswick to survey and
begin two organizing campaigns.
Assisted by Local 2698 organizer,
Randy Budge, both ran up against
employer interference and severe
intimidation of workers who wanted
to join the I.W.A.

At Skyway Lumber, a dimension
mill in Miramichi owned by Robbie
Tozer (who also owns the Nelson
plywood mill), the union had 65% of
the crew signed up to union cards in
January. When they applied to the
province’s Labour Relations Board
on a Monday, the employer hired 10

people, mostly relatives and friends,
to dilute the voters list. Under
provincial laws they could get away
with it.

At the same time Tozer put Broth-

ers Vickery and Hogan on two month

suspensions
for assisting
and en-
couraging the
organizing dri-
ves. Those
cases are com-
ing up to arbi-
tration and the
I.W.A. hopes to
win them. A
simultaneous
= campaign at
* Mike Hunter “the Chaleur
sawmill in the community of Bele-
une, about an hour and twenty min-
utes drive north of Miramichi, re-
sulted in the firings of 15 workers
who attended a meeting with the
organizers. At the time the union
barely begun the campaign and had
only 27 cards signed out of work-
force of 130.

“I was amazed by the employers’
actions in both cases,” said Budge.
“I never thought it was possible for
the employer to threaten workers
and eliminate them from the work-
place so flagrantly. It was absolutely
crazy.”

The union fought in front of the
labour board to get the workers rein-

\ a aie

© In October of last year, National E

stated with settlements ranging from
$2,500 and up. Some, who did not
return got payments of $10,000 from
the company. p-

“Tozer is an
aggressive char-
acter — there’s
no doubt about.
it — and he’s
protected by
some very anti- |
union labour
laws in the
province,” said
Hunter. “We
have to keep
hammering
away at the grip that he has on peo-
ple in New Brunswick.”

“T feel that we have to educate
people in Atlantic Canada on the
I.W.A. and what we’re about,” said
Budge. “I'd like to tell them to stay
strong and stick together. They have
to keep fighting the battle and not
let Tozer and others run them into
the ground.”

UNION FIGHTS CONCESSIONS

Shortly after the union ran into
the difficulties in organizing Tozer
asked to gut the collective agree-
ment at Nelson Forest Products. He
first tried to go directly to the crew
to ask for concessions in their cur-
rent collective agreement which
expires on March 31, 2001.

Continued on page seven

ducation Director Lyle Pona (right)
instructed an ORG I class in Miramichi.

6/LUMBERWORKERMARCH, 1999