In the last week of July 2010, workers of United Steelworkers (USW) Local 9537, who have been locked out of their workplace and on the picket-lines for nearly five months, found a big pile of shit sitting right smack-dab by their picket-line outside of a warehouse in Vaughan, just north of Toronto.[1] One could not ask for a better symbol of retail-capital’s attitude toward their workers. Workers at this supply warehouse have been locked-out since April Fool’s Day after rejecting a concessionary offer. They have been fighting an uphill battle against a nefarious employer who has not shrunk from hiring scabs and pitting the warehouse workers against the retail workers. The workers have consistently held the line; they defeated a government-forced ratification vote on May 28, and continue to show anger at their employer. Sears, not unexpectedly has continued to ‘wait it out’ (following the lead of the year long battle between Vale-Inco and USW in Sudbury) predicting that that sooner or later the energy of an isolated union local will dissipate. And the workers will be forced to come back to work with an offer not quite as concessionary, but certainly not a victory.

What is the symbolic value of shit when Sears has already hired 500 scabs ‘to replace’ the locked-out workers? A Sears representative acknowledged to Toronto Sun columnist Joe Warmington that they had dumped the crap on the line but claimed it was part of regular lawn maintenance. Striking a collegial pose, USW staff representative Terry Bea maintained that the union wasn’t accusing Sears, merely claimed that something odd was going on. But Sears worker Paul Taylor spoke more angrily and bluntly: the picketers believe that the dumping was the work of a “strike breaker from Tennessee.” This episode for Sears workers captures the central issue that is facing the Canadian labour movement: how long will the labour movement continue to take shit from an aggressive union-busting employer before fighting back?

Sears Workers, USW and Unionism

Sears Canada and Local 9537 had been in bargaining through the early months of 2010. Like in the case of Vale-Inco bargaining with USW, Sears was demanding the type of concessions that even the most conservative business unions wouldn’t accept: rollbacks to pensions, health care and other benefits, vacation days and so forth. According to USW’s external communications, the sticking point making the offer unacceptable was that the contract would stipulate with regards to benefits that they would be “as per the company policy.” Such language would give management control to set and alter benefits on their own as ‘company policy.’ This would, in all likelihood, force the benefits of the unionized warehouse workers down to the level of non-union Sears workers.

Such contractual language would defeat the very purpose of a union. The implication here is that unionized workers would lose out on the improvements to their contracts, not simply monetary gains in wages, since unionizing little over two years (in January 2008) before the round of bargaining. The union rejected the concessionary offer, although it signaled a willingness to continue bargaining. Sears, in contrast, abruptly walked away from the bargaining table on March 23, 2010, and locked-out its workers on the first of April, and continue to avoid bargaining. Why would Sears – or any firm – be so brazen with their union?

Three reasons present themselves: Sears’ desire to remain non-union; the availability of strikebreakers; and their calculation that there would be limited resistance from USW, particularly in light of how USW was stumbling through the major strike at Vale-Inco, and the wider labour movement was all but invisible in its support.

First, Sears Canada has a record of opposing unionization. Sears warehouses are basically unorganized, by USW or any other union. Winning democratic collective bargaining rights can only be seen as a victory, in any component of the distribution network connected to the retail sector. Unionization was proving especially beneficial in reversing the ratio of full time to part-time workers, with part-timers moving into full time work. Those who remained part-time were also entitled to bargaining unit representation. In a moving video interview for Basics News service, a Caribbean-Canadian worker, Michael Smith, speaks with enthusiasm about how much better life is with the union, and using the union’s slogan “we’ll be out one day longer than them.”[2] As Smith points out, this is a precedent that Sears fears. With only 500 of its 30,000 workers unionized, a successful fightback will send a message to the other workers that sticking with the union is a good idea.

Second, it seems clear that Sears assumed that in a lockout they would be able to find scabs to come in to do the work of the locked-out workers. In the midst of a recession and rising unemployment, in an area of Greater Toronto with high migration, a very fluid labour force searching for work and no tradition of unions, Sears clearly determined that if it decided to use strikebreakers, there would be a pool of labour willing to take the work up. In an isolated suburb of Toronto, there was also very little danger that the wider labour movement would organize themselves to block scabs from getting in. The locked-out workers would be on their own, and it was easy enough to work out the logistics of getting them in and out, with nothing in the way of community reprisals to worry about. Indeed, like Vale-Inco, Sears Canada is using AFI International Group, “North America’s leader in crisis management and response,” which is essentially a strike-breaking and scab-firm, to ensure that scabs can get to the workplace. Even in Sudbury, the USW discouraged reprisals against scabs. One can imagine the same messaging is occurring in Vaughan.

Third, when looked at from the perspective of an aggressive employer, it would be easy to make an assessment that in the current period USW has a decidedly mixed record when it comes to successful fightbacks. It is unclear, for instance, how well this new local is being supported and how well the new union members are being educated on union issues and, indeed, even on the lockout. One locked-out worker interviewed by me stated that he was better informed by management than the union. This was even to the point of hearing about the lockout and contract details from management. Yet, this worker was clear that life improved at Sears when the union came in. He said many found the culture of the union very distant, repeatedly mentioning distance between the rank and file and the stewards, even implying that there was more distance between workers and stewards, often off for training sessions, than between workers and management. While understanding of the union and its purposes, this worker feels in the dark about his own union’s demands, tactics and strategy. On the other hand, he feels informed by management, which sends regular “official” information to the workers. Sounding a note of dismay, he said that he felt the lockout could go on for another couple of months, “like Sudbury.”

Observing the fallout of the Vale-Inco strike in Sudbury, the academic and queer activist Gary Kinsman warned of the Steelworkers as too much acting like a “business union.” This was specifically in reference to USW 6500 (and one could also point to the problems that driving instructors of USW 9511 found themselves in, with also an unclear strategy to widen the strike effort and keep members informed). It seems that the description that Scott Neigh applied to USW 6500 might well apply to USW 9537 – “an internal culture that has not always fostered participatory governance or spaces and resources devoted to facilitating social movement-like mobilization of rank-and-file workers.” In Vaughan, as in Sudbury, there is no strategy to politicize the lockout more broadly, draw out community and labour movement support, in the hope that conventional collective bargaining by a few leaders will be enough to defeat an aggressive employer today.

This is not at all to say that the USW’s record is completely bleak. USW Local 1005 at Stelco in Hamilton did a fine job in helping the workers resist concessions and layoffs via developing a more participatory union structure. Through broad community and labour support, they were able to go so far as to ensure that Stelco and U.S. Steel not only got mud in their face, but actually was found to be legally fraudulent. The struggle was waged with broad community support, and was framed not merely as an economic struggle, but a political struggle that united communities across Hamilton. The experiences of the workers of USW 9537, however, are quite different from the Stelco workers.

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A spokesman for the United Steelworkers Union says he’s not surprised by Vale print ads criticising the union’s role in the Voisey’s Bay strike. The ad outlines several financial proposals, and says the union doesn’t understand the math involved. But Boyd Bussey says one of the company’s tactics since the beginning of negotiations has been to misrepresent the facts instead of returning to the bargaining table. He says his math is dead on, and Vale’s math is wrong. He says the company needs to give up this kind of tactic. He says it’s intimidation, and everytime the union makes statements in the press, Vale charges the union. He says they are making the union spend its money and are trying to bust it, instead of coming to the table and negotiating a fair deal.

The strike has been ongoing for more than a year, and Bussey says there is no end in sight. He says he’s asked Danny Williams to get involved. He says Williams is supposed to be looking at alternatives and getting back to the union. He says to this date, the company has not shown any interest in returning to the bargaining table.

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A long-running labour dispute at the Voisey’s Bay nickel mine in northern Labrador has spilled over into the courts.

Darren Cove, president of the United Steelworkers local at Voisey’s Bay, said he was served Monday with documents in a civil lawsuit.

Cove said a statement of claim filed by Vale alleges that Cove defamed the company when he recently said it was treating its workers like second-class citizens.

About 200 Steelworkers members in Labrador have been off the job since early August in 2009, in a strike over wages and benefits.

Cove said lawyers for the Steelworkers have told him they have never before seen an employer use such a tactic in a labour dispute.

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Representatives for United Steelworkers and Vale Ltd. met Friday to discuss the union’s complaint that contractors are doing work that 18 laid-off Steelworkers could be doing.

USW staff representative Myles Sullivan said the parties are trying to reach a resolution about the use of contractors as operations at the nickel company begin to return to normal after an almost year-long strike.

About 2,700 members of USW Local 6500 are back to work six weeks after they approved a new five-year collective agreement with the nickel company based in Brazil.

Vale spokeswoman Angie Robson said all employees except the 18 workers laid off are back on the job and all of Vale’s Sudbury plants are on their way to ramping up to full production.

Both furnaces have been fired up at the Copper Cliff Smelter Complex, and Vale is predicting it will return to full production in Sudbury by the end of September.

But Sullivan said life has not returned to normal for his 18 members who were told just after the strike ended that they no longer had jobs.

Tensions are also running high in many workplaces as Steelworkers off the job for more than a year, in some instances, reclaim their places in the company.

Sullivan said a “high volume” of grievances has been filed by the union on behalf of members in the six weeks since the new contract was accepted and Steelworkers began returning to work.

Under the terms of the return-to-work protocol signed by the two sides, Vale had six weeks to call Steelworkers back to their jobs.

Grievances have been filed relating to a number of issues, said Sullivan — such as discipline, hours of work, shift schedules and paid lunches.

In some cases, union members have complained that personal belongings such as tools and gear was missing when they returned to their operations.

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BURNABY, B.C. – The United Steelworkers said Thursday that some 260 workers at the Endako Mines open pit and milling operations in northern B.C. have officially joined the union.

The mine, which is owned by Thompson Creek Metals Co. Inc. (TSX:TCM), produces molybdenum, which is used in the manufacture of metal alloys and stainless steel.

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The longest strike in the history of bruising labour conflict in the rich Sudbury mining region has ended after almost a year.

The United Steelworkers confirmed Thursday night that 3,100 striking members at Vale SA’s sprawling operations in the northern Ontario city and a small refinery in Port Colborne had voted about 75.5 per cent for a five-year contract containing wage improvements and some concessions.

Picket lines will come down during the next week as the Brazil-based mining giant starts a recall of many unhappy workers and a long process of rebuilding labour relations to improve productivity.

“We never got everything we wanted but taking a stand and fighting made a difference,” said Wayne Fraser, the union’s Ontario and Atlantic director. “It was necessary because if you choose to roll over, you are sure to lose. It is historic what happened here. It made change.”

Vale vice-president John Pollesel said the company looks forward to a return by workers after “a long, hard year for everyone.”

“It’s now time to come together and focus on building the strong and sustainable operations that Sudbury and Port Colborne require,” he said in a statement.

The strike became a classic labour-management struggle where Vale used its economic power as one of the world’s biggest mining companies to push for cost cuts against the Steelworkers in a union stronghold.

Vale hired replacement workers to continue operations, fired employees for alleged misconduct, sued the union and spent millions of dollars on extra security.

The strike, which started last July 13, marked the first time the company’s mines and other operations resumed partial production during a strike in more than 50 years that the union had represented workers. It left a lasting impression with them that labour relations had changed, and the strike would be long and hard.

The strike marked the ninth walkout at the former Inco operations since 1958 including an 8 ½-month walkout by more than 11,000 workers in 1978-79. That was the biggest strike in Canadian history in terms of worker-lost days.

Labour watchers say the outcome may prompt other multinational companies in Canada to take similar tough stances against unions to drive down costs and increase profits as global competition increases.

Vale officials have acknowledged the company, which lost hundreds of millions of dollars in output, faces a lot of work in winning the trust and support of workers to boost productivity as costs rise in mining the region’s ore reserves of nickel, copper, silver gold and other minerals.

Vale and the union finally reached agreement on all terms last month, but the deal stalled for several days on the issue of dealing with the fate of 12 fired workers. A provincial labour board will start hearing arguments to settle the lingering dispute on Friday.

Fraser, a former Inco worker, called negotiations with the company “horrifying” during the last year.

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The negotiating committee for United Steelworkers Local 2724, representing more than 600 salaried supervisory and technical personnel inside Essar Steel Algoma Inc., is seeking strike authorization from its membership less than a month prior to the expiration of its three-year contract.

The local will conclude two days of special membership meetings Tuesday at the Days Inn.

The update meeting is scheduled to begin at noon, with strike authorization voting from 6 a.m. through 8 p.m. at 2724’s Days Inn office, while Monday evening’s meeting and vote was at the Marconi Hall.

A strike authorization vote is essentially a show of membership solidarity for its bargaining committee and puts the local in a legal strike position, if necessary, at the expiration of its contract.

Three-year contracts between the Sault Ste. Marie steel maker and its two unions, including Local 2251, representing more than 2,500 hourly production, maintenance, service and clerical employees, and Local 2724, expire at 12:01 a.m. Aug. 1.

As of Monday afternoon, the 2251 negotiating team had not yet called on its membership for strike authorization, but has called special membership meetings for Wednesday, at 9 a.m. and 7:30 p.m. at the Great Northern Hotel and Conference Centre, to discuss the company’s proposed asset integrity proposal in the event of a labour disruption.

The asset integrity proposal, according to Mike Da Prat, president of Local 2251, relates to staffing in such areas as “the coke oven batteries and other ancillary operations that need to be maintained and kept operating in the event of a labour disruption.”

During the last negotiations, in 2007, the company trained its more than 100 non-union personnel and hired contract workers to augment its non-union people, on operating tasks such as the coke ovens, utilities and material handling, as well as fire and flood patrolling throughout the steelworks.

While Da Prat says negotiations, which began with an exchange of proposals more than a month ago, on June 1, are “plodding along” the local’s website is reporting that 2251 submitted its monetary proposal to the company a week ago, on June 28.

Monetary proposals are traditionally one of the last items of discussion in the negotiating process.

“We are still awaiting the company’s response … I wouldn’t read too much into the proposal at this stage, there are still outstanding issues on the table,” said Da Prat.

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VAUGHAN, Ont. – Locked-out workers at a Sears Canada warehouse in Vaughan, Ont., have voted to reject the latest contract offer by the company, the union representing the roughly 500 employees said Tuesday.

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The month of May has been designated by United Steelworkers Local 6500 in Canada as “anti-scab” month, a reference to the strikebreakers that the Brazilian mining company Vale is using in efforts to break a ten-month strike in the provinces of Ontario and Labrador/Newfoundland.

Some 200 steelworkers and other supporters rallied in Queen’s Park, Toronto, on 29 April to support introduction of legislation in the Ontario Parliament that would outlaw the use of striker replacements during economic strikes or lockouts. Many of the steelworkers arrived after long bus rides from Sudbury, Ontario, where they experience first-hand the family hardships and community strife brought on by the bargaining intransigence of a company content to use scabs to regain partial production.

On 29 April, the Private Member’s Bill that again would prohibit companies operating in Ontario from using scabs passed a first reading in Parliament by a 32-3 vote. The bill was introduced by New Democratic Party legislators France Gelinas and Peter Kormos.

Somewhat surprisingly, 21 members of the ruling Liberal Party joined with eight New Democrats and three Progressive Conservatives to pass this first reading. The bill must proceed through two more hearings before becoming law, and that could happen by year’s end. In Canada, most labour code is enacted at the provincial level.

Quebec and British Colombia are currently the only two provinces that prohibit the use of replacement workers during strikes or lockouts. In Ontario, such a prohibition was on the books from 1992 to 1995, but was repealed in 1995 when Liberals took control of the Parliament. Gelinas presented proof that legislation banning companies from using replacement workers leads to shorter strikes, less volatile picket-line scenes, less family and community stress, and overall, better labour-management relations.

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614 days.

On a makeshift wooden sign affixed to a post, striking workers at Engineered Coated Products keep a tally of the number of days they’ve been off the job.

For 20 months, the workers, initially about 80 and now an estimated 60, have been camped outside the Elgin Street company as busloads of replacement workers are brought in daily to keep the packaging plant operational.

There has been no negotiation between the workers, represented by the United Steelworkers union, and the company since last July when the two sides met with a government conciliator.

And it seems unlikely they will be talking any time soon.

“It takes a toll,” admitted Rick Willson, a 33-year employee at ECP. “There’s nobody here to help.”

The strike began on Aug. 23, 2008 when Saul Marques, secretary- treasurer for United Steelworkers, Local 1-500, said the company demanded workers take a 25% wage cut, along with a cut in benefits and changes to their pension plan. The company, said Marques, also wanted to implement “continental” 12-hour shifts that would have resulted in job losses.

The workers, who earn between $17 and $23 an hour, had offered to take a 12% pay cut and other concessions in a three-year deal.

“The company wants us to agree to a 25% wage decrease or they won’t even talk,” said Marques. “It’s blackmail. Collective bargaining is supposed to be an exchange of facts. They’ve never provided us with any information.

“It’s been long enough. It’s time for the company to tell us their intent.”

ECP is part of the Intertape Polymer Group, which operates 10 plants in North America. The company bought the Brantford plant several years ago.

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