*Quebec Wal-Mart gets union deal*

Jean-Francois Bertrand
Canwest News Service

Friday, August 15, 2008

GATINEAU, Que - A Gatineau, Que., Wal-Mart became the first in North America with a union contract in effect Friday when a collective agreement was put into place between the retailer and eight employees of an auto shop.

After a three-year process that ended with a ruling by an arbitrator, workers of Local 486 of the United Food and Commercial Workers Canada should see their wages rise to a minimum of $11.54 an hour from the current $8.50 an hour.

The 50-page agreement represents 98 per cent of what the union asked for, said union local president Guy Chenier. Workers who install tires, change oil and fill propane tanks made gains on their salary for statutory holidays worked, have more generous vacations, and will see their wages increase periodically.

The three-year agreement replaces a system where technicians were paid minimum wage and where increases of 30 cents an hour were granted "randomly" after a year or six months, said Chenier.

He said that while Wal-Mart might want to close the Gatineau location, across the river from Ottawa, it would be difficult because "we have a collective agreement in our hands." Only the eights employees at the Tire & Lube Express centre are affected by the decision, while the 200 staff inside the store are not unionized.

Wal-Mart Canada spokesman Andrew Pelletier said that the company is "carefully reviewing the decision and its implications."

There is a new, larger Wal-Mart four kilometres to the west. When asked if closing older Gatineau location was in the realm of possibilities, Pelletier said he would not speculate and "we're still looking at the decision."

In 2005, Wal-Mart shut down its Jonquiere, Que., store, days before an arbitrator was to impose a contract. The Supreme Court of Canada has agreed to hear the union's case that Wal-Mart violated Quebec's labour laws, as well as the Charter of Rights, when it closed the Jonquiere store, about 220 kilometres north of Quebec City.

A Wal-Mart store in Windsor, Ont., was the first to have a collective agreement in the 1990s, but the union was decertified before the contract officially came into effect.

The Gatineau Wal-Mart's collective agreement came into force Friday. If on Aug. 28 workers do not see their higher wages on their paycheque, "we will grieve the next day," said Chenier. "We want the collective agreement to be enforced."

The unionization was recognized by Quebec's Labour Board in June 2005, but a month later, the employer requested a judicial review. In February 2006, Justice Diane Marcelin of Quebec's Superior Court rejected Wal-Mart's request, and in July 2006, the minister of labour referred the dispute to an arbitrator. Hearings ended in early June.

At the arbitration hearing, the union filed the actuarial study they commissioned.

"It analyzed the salary of 3,400 technicians across the province, including 32 Wal-Marts. The salaries varied from $10.28 to $16.06," said Chenier, adding that the company did not contest that report.

Arbitrator Alain Corriveau, imposed an agreement where the starting salary would be $11.54. A worker with 2,000 to 4,000 hours of experience would get $12.91, while those with less than 6,000 hours of experience would receive $14.77 per hour. Above that experience, the hourly wage for 2008 is $15.17.

"There is also a 2.5 per cent increase for 2009 and 2010. We wanted a three-year agreement, the company only one year," explained the local president.

Corriveau is expected to make a decision with regards to a St-Hyacinthe, Que., Wal-Mart, 60 kilometres southeast of Montreal. There, 200 associates and 10 technicians, already unionized and part of the United Food and Commercial Workers Canada, are awaiting their first collective agreement.

For Chenier, the long battle was worth it.

"We are agents of change. We have to do the work, otherwise everything heads downhill. The 'Wal-Mart state' drives everything down."
© Ottawa Citizen 2008