WM employees are claiming that both WM and the UFCW are applying undue pressure since the Jonquiere closing was announced:
Workers at various Wal-Marts around Quebec say they are being pressured by both management and labor. They describe a workplace atmosphere poisoned by rumor-mongering, insults and damage to personal property.UPDATE: The version of Clifford Kraus' article linked above was in the International Herald Tribune. The IHT leaves out some very interesting details from the same article in the New York Times:Anti-union workers at the Ste-Foy store, which other workers are trying to organize, reported unwanted visits to their homes in the middle of the night by organizers during the unionization drive. Two pro-union cashiers at the St-Hyacinthe store near Montreal reported that they recently had shortages in their registers, which they maintained were the work of management trickery to get them into trouble.
"This store is basically hell right now," said Noella Langlois, 53, a clothing saleswoman in the Jonqui�re store who opposes unionization. "You have two deeply divided clans."
Intimidation appears to go both ways, according to workers at three Wal-Mart stores in Quebec.Sylvie Lavoie, a 40-year-old single mother and part-time cashier in the Jonqui�re store who says she needs a union, accused store managers of taking workers aside before the secret vote and warning them that a union would mean the store would close.
Afterward the workers came to union organizers crying and pleading for promises that they would not lose their jobs.
"They intimidate and do what they want," Ms. Lavoie said.
But Steve Lemieux, a 20-year-old cart pusher in the Ste. Foy store, says it is the union that is the abuser. "People who are for the unions have trouble accepting other opinions and they keep knocking on our doors to get us to sign their cards," he said.
"We don't need a union since there is easy advancement if you work for it."
The IHT has:
But in contrast to their counterparts in the United States, unions in Canada have had traces of success in organizing at Wal-Mart.
While the NYT has:
But in contrast to their counterparts in the United States, unions in Canada have had traces of success in organizing. For the giant American chain, Jonqui�re has become another barricade in its battle to keep unions out of its business.
IHT:
Unionizing efforts at Wal-Marts in North America have virtually never made progress.
NYT:
Unionizing efforts at Wal-Marts in North America have virtually never stuck.
In the IHT, but not the NYT:
In Windsor, union leaders said Wal-Mart posted news of the Jonqui�re closing in the lunchroom; Wal-Mart says if such a posting was made, it was by an employee and not the corporation.
Posted by Kevin on March, 10 2005 at 11:13 AM
