The toll of the two-year strike
Greg Clarkson says he believes in the fight, but is just months away from losing his house.
Clarkson is one of 84 workers currently on strike at Engineered Coating Products.
He has worked for the local fabrics coating company located on Elgin Street for 15 years. He has been on strike for two.
He has three kids and can’t afford to have them all in organized sports.
“I’m very angry and upset,” Clarkson said on the two-year anniversary of the ECP strike. “It’s hard and the kids suffer because they don’t understand the full scale of what’s going on.
“You work for a company for that many years, it gets bought by an American firm not wanting a union and they’ve threatened us from day one with cuts.”
The U.S.-owned firm Intertape Polymer Group that bought ECP in 2005 wants to start negotiating cuts to workers’ wages and benefits at 25 per cent.
In 2009, the union representing Clarkson and his co-workers counter-offered with a package that offered rollbacks, that included a 12.5 per cent wage reduction.
Clarkson said it would be possible for him to just get another job, but he said it is unlikely he would make more than minimum wage.
Clarkson and other workers on the ECP picket line, told Brant News on Monday they are making $225 a week, while the two-year-old strike drags on.
“I believe in the fight because it’s not just about me,” Clarkson said. “This is happening everywhere and Brantford has lost a lot of good companies.”
Clarkson said he’s very concerned with the number of good-paying jobs Brantford has lost.
“I think someone in government should be putting a stop to this,” Clarkson said. “The temp workers working at our jobs in there are all from Hamilton and Ancaster, so the wages are not staying in Brantford.”
