In April 2023, hundreds of unionized workers were fired at the Civeo Wapasu Creek Lodge, a massive work camp that serves Imperial Oil’s Kearl oilsands mine, after the workers refused wage rollbacks.
These workers did the important work of making and serving the food, keeping the facilities clean and doing the housekeeping in the rooms.
Just a few months after the mass layoffs, a group called the United Workforce Group (UWG) signed a new collective agreement with the employer, giving into many of the concessions the laid off workers refused. The UWG collective agreement is “significantly inferior” to the old United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) Local 401 contract, according to Bob Barnetson, a professor of labour relations at Athabasca University.
The new United Workforce Group contract is on the left, the old UFCW Local 401 contract is on the right.
The disparities between the two contracts are large. Under the old contract, a 1st cook made $33.15 an hour; now they make $25.50, a decrease of $7.65 an hour, or 23 per cent.
A housekeeping coordinator used to make 29.60 an hour under the old UFCW contract; under the UWG contract, that same worker now makes $24.48 an hour, a reduction of $5.12 an hour, or 17 per cent.
“From a worker’s perspective, the United Workforce Group contract is significantly inferior to the UFCW contract,” said Barnetson.
According to Barnetson, not only are the UWG wage rates significantly lower than the 2021 UFCW rates in nominal dollars, but inflation during this period exacerbates the difference in real dollars. “Workers are financially much worse off under the UWG agreement and the company has significantly reduced its labour costs,” said Barnetson.
In July 2022, Civeo signed a 12 year, $500 million contract with Imperial Oil to provide camp services.
Barnetson found several other employer-friendly clauses in the UGW contract. The employer RRSP matching program under UGW is capped at four per cent of wages while UFCW’s it was capped at five per cent.
The UGW agreement allows contracting out of bargaining unit work, whereas the UFCW agreement precluded it, Barnetson noted. The UFCW agreement allows for better union representation (more stewards, better access) than the UWG agreement, and has narrower language on drug and alcohol testing.
UFCW has filed an unfair labour practices complaint with the Alberta Labour Relations Board (ALRB) over the layoffs.
So who is the UWG? Its Twitter bio describes itself as a “progressive, partnership-driven labour union.”
Its website has no contact information and not a single person associated with it in any role is named. According to the website for an affiliated signatory, UWG is a renamed and rebranded Western Canada Employees’ Association. That rebranding happened in 2022.
A corporate search turns up no record of any organization with that name. An old ALRB application from April 2023, thankfully archived at the Alberta Worker, shows Mark Phillips as the union contact for a UWG application to the ALRB to certify all "[a]ll roadbuilding and heavy construction employees,” at Grand Sierra Construction. Phillips referred us to Kevin Buhler who he said was responsible for this file. Buhler is also listed as a UWG contact for a certification for Knelsen Sand and Gravel from April 2024.
“The whole story on our end is there is a collective agreement between Lighthouse (the employer at Civeo Wapasu) and UWG,” said Buhler. “They’re working under it happily.”
Buhler said he doesn’t know how many workers who had been laid off ended up working under the new contract. When this writer brought up the large disparity in wages between the old contract and the UWG contract, he ended the conversation.
UFCW’s unfair labour practices complaint on the layoffs is likely to be heard in August.