Viterra head office employees who are members of the Grain Services Union voted overwhelmingly June 9 to reject the company’s last contract offer.
Meanwhile, two other GSU bargaining units voted this month, including one representing 90 workers at former AgPro facilities in Manitoba and Alberta. It voted 85.5 percent in favour of accepting the company’s offer.
Results from the unit representing 700 country
operations and maintenance employees will be known June 20.
At head office in Regina, 83 percent of employees who cast ballots said no to the offer and authorized the union to call a strike. The turnout represented 88.5 percent of 194 eligible voters.
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Hugh Wagner, GSU secretary manager, was not surprised by the results in Manitoba and Alberta, saying those employees work in an environment surrounded by a host of non-unionized operations and felt they had few options.
“Each unit gets to make their own decisions,” he said.
“If (country operations) decides as we recommended – to reject the employer’s final offer – then both will be in a position to take actions this summer.”
The previous contracts for all three groups expired Jan. 31. Since that time, bargaining has been conducted with the assistance of a federally appointed conciliator, whose term expired June 10.
Viterra president Mayo Schmidt said the company will continue to operate if a strike or lockout occurs.
“In the event of a labour disruption, we will be focused on business as usual, providing our customers with the services they’ve come to expect.”
Viterra has proposed a five-year contract, with annual wage increases of five to six percent and further incentives based on an annual performance review.
A company spokesperson said the offer represented “a significant commitment to providing our employees with the best pay and benefits the business can support.”
Schmidt said the company’s approach to bargaining is based on three principles: a commitment to market-based pay and benefits, balancing the needs of employees with the interests of customers and shareholders, and common terms and conditions of employment for all Viterra employees.
The union said employees are unhappy with a proposal to remove group life insurance and benefits plans from the agreement and run them unilaterally; pay rates based on performance reviews, which employees say are open to favouritism; and a change in hours of work for head office employees that would eliminate a monthly earned day off.
The writer of this story is a member of a different GSU bargaining unit.
