Amazon to face legal pushback as anger over Quebec facility closures grows

The conflict lines person been drawn successful a increasing feud betwixt Amazon and workers successful Quebec arsenic the national prepares to denote a suit successful retribution to the company’s province-wide installation closures.

On Jan. 22, the U.S. e-commerce elephantine said it volition adjacent each 7 of its facilities successful Quebec implicit the adjacent mates of months, laying disconnected astir 2,ooo imperishable and impermanent workers — a fig the Ministry of Labour has since confirmed volition really transcend 4,500 aft including transportation work partners.

Caroline Senneville, president of Confédération des syndicats nationaux (CSN), said it volition beryllium presenting its ineligible situation connected Tuesday.

“Our ineligible section is moving truly hard and has been for the past fewer days, and we volition beryllium capable to denote connected what grounds the institution breached labour codification and what ineligible enactment we volition take,” she said.

Senneville said this could see a combat for idiosyncratic compensation connected apical of their bundle with up to 14 weeks’ pay.

Amazon spokesperson Barbara Agrait said the determination to shutter each Quebec facilities “wasn’t made lightly,” and was a mode to supply “even much savings to our customers implicit the agelong run.”

Senneville said large corporations person a past successful Quebec of closing down erstwhile unions travel about, citing the departure of a Walmart store successful Jonquiere backmost successful 2005.

“They were recovered blameworthy (of trying to destruct oregon weaken a union),” she said. “Closing store due to the fact that a national has travel successful is illegal.”

Agrait has consistently denied the closures are linked to the caller unionization propulsion successful the state aft 1 of the company’s warehouses successful Laval, Que., managed to unionize backmost successful May 2024, becoming the company’s archetypal Canadian warehouse to bash so.

“Of people Amazon is going to contradict it until the end,” Senneville said.

However, portion the CSN prepares to situation the multinational institution successful court, DT Cochrane, a elder economist astatine the Canadian Labour Congress, said the powerfulness imbalance betwixt a elephantine similar Amazon and a national is truthful ample that immoderate combat a national puts up against them is excessively insignificant to impact immoderate change.

“The institution has unthinkable amounts of resources to give to this ineligible conflict that unions simply don’t have, particularly erstwhile you deliberation astir the workers astatine the halfway of these battles,” Cochrane said.

“It drags retired implicit years and years, those workers volition person moved connected to different jobs retired of necessity, and truthful you’ve mislaid the precise radical of radical who are astir instantly being harmed by what corporations similar this are doing.”

Big companies cognize that this imbalance exists, and are much than blessed to exploit it, Cochrane added. It’s portion of the outgo they privation workers and unions to see successful their calculations for whether oregon not they prosecute that benignant of ineligible action.

“Even if they bash prosecute it each the mode to the extremity and the national wins a favourable decision, what volition the eventual outgo for Amazon be? Probably adjacent to thing compared to what they spot arsenic the outgo of letting workers get distant with this benignant of organizing,” Cochrane said.

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Amazon has said it respects its employees’ determination whether to articulation a union.

“Our employees person the prime of whether oregon not to articulation a union. They ever have. We favour opportunities for each idiosyncratic to beryllium respected and valued arsenic an individual, and to person their unsocial dependable heard by moving straight with our team,” the institution said.

“The information is, Amazon already offers what galore unions are requesting: competitory pay, wellness benefits connected time one, and opportunities for vocation growth.”

The national claims this isn’t true. Senneville said there’s a wage spread of $8 connected the hourly wage betwixt Amazon warehouse workers and different warehouse workers successful the province.

And erstwhile it comes to wellness and safety, she claims the institution adjacent discourages workers from going to the province’s wellness compensation board.

The national said the warehouse that managed to unionize successful Laval saw 160 retired of 200 workers study injuries wrong a year.

Senneville added workers are told to instrumentality immoderate Tylenol, a mates days disconnected and are discouraged from filing immoderate workplace wounded report.

“And those workers are chiefly immigrants. So they don’t cognize our laws. They don’t cognize that they person rights adjacent though they’re not unionized. The institution makes it truthful that they don’t workout their rights adjacent arsenic regular workers,” Senneville said.

The CSN is expected to denote its ineligible situation connected Tuesday morning.