© 363 COURTENAY BC

Weyco continues to contract out
Local 363 reports that, despite the decision
of Judge MacKenzie in favour of the IWA
on contracting out (see page one),
Weyerhaeuser North Island Timber
continues to recklesslessly contract out work
in phases. The latest company crew to be hit
are haulers. Weyco has been using
contractors who are underreporting the
number of workers on the claim. Local
president Rick Wangler says last year grade,
falling and hauling crews were hit the
hardest and that, despite the 2001 Vince
Ready decision on the size of the bargaining
unit, Weyco is hell-bent to contract out. “This
is an issue that needs to be solved at the
bargaining table with the mediator’s assistance,”
he says. “We also hope that contracting out
umpire will get them to back off.”

© 4-425 | WILLIAMS LAKE BC

Local sees little early impact on
merger of Lignum with Riverside
On February 2, Riverside Forest Products
announced that it intends to buy out
Lignum Ltd. which has a state-of-the-art
sawmill in Williams Lake, B.C. Riverside
has a giant sawmill, next door to Lignum,
which operates on a three shift basis.
Both mills, as well as the nearby Riverside
Soda Creek stud mill, should continue to
operate for the foreseeable future says
IWA Canada Local 1-425 president Wade
Fisher, whose local represents the
workers at all three mills. "Under the
Liberal’s new forest policies, government
approval is virtually not needed," he
notes. “These companies can make up
‘heir minds and do whatever they want,
any time they want to.”

© 4-3567| FRASER VALLEY BC

Interfor and Canfor loggers
face loss of jobs in sell-off

Local 1-3567 Interfor Hope and Canfor
Harrison Lake logging crews face the
harsh reality that their jobs will be elim-
inated as these companies dispose of
cutting licences under the guise of the
20 per cent clawback. Fifty IWA jobs at
Interfor are to be gone by the end of
2004, as a grapple yarder, tower, road-
building, truckers and others are to be
cut. Over 80 per cent of the workers live
in Hope, an area already hard hit. In
Harrison, despite the local negotiating
an agreement to hand the whole bar-
ganing unit over to a contractor, Canfor
intends to bunch-up the clawback and
slash union jobs.

306 MIRAMICHI NB

New Brunswick local reaches a

first agreement with Bercon Ltd.
Local 306 president Mario Fortunato is
pleased to announce that, in early
February, the local reached a first agree-
ment with Bercon Atlantic Ltd., a division
of Saputo, of St. John. The two-year con-
tract, with covers 6 workers, will see wage
adjustments of 43 cents per hour for four
workers and a three per cent increase for
all, over two years. Other improvements
include meal and boot allowances, sick
pay at 100 per cent for up to 45 days, and
ums, bereavement leave, jury duty, call
time, paid breaks, seniority, benefits and

400 QUEBEC

Simmons negotiations underway
Local 1000 business agent Yvon Rochon
reports bargaining is underway in Kirkland
with the Simmons mattress company.
Brother Rochon heads the negotiating
committee, working with plant chair Gilman
Plourde, vice-chair Mario Malenfant, Adrien
Aubut, and Darlene Jalbert. He says
progress, since talks began on January 21, has
been steady with some contract language
issues resolved. Progress is still needed on
injury coverage, the bonus system and some
monetary issues. This year, the company’s
negotiating team has no lawyer present,
which Rochon says “is a very good thing!”

THUNDER BAY ON

Domtar White River operations
return to work in mid-February
Local 2693 president Joe Hanlon told The
Allied Worker that about 200 IWA
members returned to work at the Domtar
White River mill and bush operations on
February 15, following a seven month
shutdown. The mill is working four ten-
hour days, with some trades starting at
staggered hours. Both sides resolved eight
contracting out cases and agreed to no
further contracting out. There is a
provision to allow Domtar to surge hire
workers for a 6o-day period under the
terms and conditions of the collective
agreement, provided all senior members
are working. In March of 2003 Domtar
eliminated 30-35 mill jobs. It has recently
decided to close the maintenance shop,
eliminating 12 jobs. Brother Hanlon
commends the crew for seeking innovative
solutions and that “workers have the real
answers to increase efficiency.”

700 TORONTO ON

Deal reached at Greif Containers
and talks start with Hy and Zel’s
Ron Diotte, president of IWA Local

700, informed The Allied Worker that a
three-year agreement has been reached
with Greif Containers in Milton. The
new contract, which provides an
improved life insurance package and
better dental coverage, pays a five per

cent increase over three years. In other
news the local is in bargaining with
newly-organized Hy and Zel’s opera-
tions in Newmarket and Hamilton.
Brother Diotte says the union is
shocked that the Hamilton store applied
for conciliation even before talks began,
something it can’t do under the law.

NORTHCENTRAL ON

Strike averted at Pembroke plant

Local 1000 president Michael McCarter is
pleased to inform The Allied Worker that a
strike was narrowly averted at the
Commonwealth plywood and veneer plant
in Pembroke, Ontario. By a two-thirds
majority, 10 workers ratified a six-year
agreement in early March, retroactive to
May 1, 2003, which will see wage increases
of 2.5 per cent in each year. The IWA also
negotiated increases to benefits and kept
seniority intact with with some progressive
modifications. It also got an increase to
shift premiums and the education fund,
which will pay six cents per member hour
worked by the end of the contract. The crew
was two weeks into a strike deadline. “We
were on the verge of walking out, had it not
been for last minute movement by the
company,” says McCarter.

500 HANOVER ON

Agreements signed at Hanover
Kitchens and Hartmann egg trays
Local 500 president Bruce Weber says
that in January, a 14-month agreement
was signed with the Hartmann egg tray
plant in Brantford, with a wage increase
and boost to a defined benefit pension
plan. The plant employs some 340 union
members. The local also signed a three
year deal with Hanover Kitchens, in
Hanover, with 3.5 per cent across-the-
board wage increases each year. Brother
Weber says that, following successful
trade shows, the company hopes to grow
the workforce. He adds that jobs are
being added at the TDS plants in
Hagersville and Tilsonburg, where 30
and 80 workers are being hired,
respectively. Brother Weber says that last
year Local 500 averaged 2,600 members,
the highest since 1986.

FILE RTO BY NORMAN GARCIA
= Local 2693 members are back to
work at Domtar White River operations.

KAPUSKASING ON

Local get contract in Hearst and
send delegates to CLC School
Local 2995 president Guy Bourgouin
reports that the local has reached a
three-year agreement with Hearst and
Community Assisted Living, a home for
the handicapped, where 10 IWA
members work. The contract has wage
and benefit improvements and
improved contract language. In early
February, the local met with newly
certified members at the Hornepayne
School District to formulate demands
for upcoming negotiations (see story
page nine). Brother Bourgouin says that
15 local union members were to attend
the cancelled CLC Winter School in
Port Elgin, Ontario in February, taking
job steward training and advanced
courses. Local union instructors were to
be: Diane Gerard of Norbord Cochrane
and Luc Servant of Tembec Chapleau;
and first-time instructors Lorne
Stenabaugh of Spruce Falls bush
operations near Kapuskasing and Tony
Delaurier of Norbord in Cochrane.

LaoleU})| DEAN LOTT e

LOCAL 1-207 e ALBERTA

PHOTO BY NICK STEWART
1B Dean Lott is the Alberta local's new

financial-secretary.

place. Dean had been working so many hours, first at a sum-

mer job, and then during the year, that he thought he should

be entitled to full-time benefits and a union card. It was a quick
'_ lesson learned — you have to stand up for yourself! After the
“layoff” he scoured Grande Cache for full-time work and found
a job working for a non-union contractor doing clean-up at the
Weyerhaeuser sawmill in town. There were no benefits and no
job security. After three years, Dean says he was lucky to land a
union job in the mill and started at the back-end, piling strips,
in February 1994. Then it was off to the planer, where Dean
become a shop steward and active committee member. Dean’s

Once fired for trying to join a union -
he’s now a full-time IWA Canada rep

When he first tried intense commitment to strengthen the union at
to join a union at Weyerhaeuser, caught the local union’s attention. He
the Byers Transport became the chief shop steward at Weyco and rose quickly
company in Grande through the ranks. In February 2002, he was hired on as a
Cache, Alberta, full-time local union business
Dean Lott mysteri- “WE STILL DEPEND agent. He became an acting
ously received a lay- PRIMAR' financial secretary in April of
off slip after being QUE Y last year and then oficlly
fired in the first RESOURCESECTOR —took on the job in December
TOMAKEALIVING.””  oflast year. Born in Edmonton
in 1970, Dean soon moved to
~ DEAN LOTT Grande Cache as his father
FIN-SEC LOCAL 1-207 _ Jim, employed by the Plains-
Western Gas and Electrical

company as a welder, worked on the town’s construction.
“We moved around a bit as a family as my dad sought to
apply his trade,” says Dean. “Today life in parts of Alberta is
really not much different. We still depend on the primary
resource sector to make a living, even though itis getting
more and more difficult to do so.”

MARCH 2004 THE ALLIED WORKER ar 7