Unionized workers at Richardson International’s oilseed crush plant at Lethbridge, Alta. plan to seek mediation after voting to reject the company’s contract offer.
United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) Local 401, which represents about 140 workers at the Lethbridge plant, said Monday its members had voted 79 per cent to reject the offer.
The workers’ previous contract expired at the end of August 2019; the union and company had agreed during earlier talks to seek a five-year contract taking it through to Aug. 31, 2024.
Votes were held in Lethbridge Dec. 16 and online Dec. 17, after the company put forward “what they describe as their last best and final offer,” UFCW said Dec. 10.
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UFCW spokesperson Chris O’Halloran, in the union’s Dec. 10 notice, said there’s “never as much money in one of these offers as we would like.”
The union said Monday it will now apply to go to mediation, emphasizing that process is meant to help parties “clarify their positions and reach a compromise.”
Mediation would continue for at least two days before the union can ask the provincially appointed mediator to “write out” — that is, provide non-binding recommendations in the event that talks don’t produce a deal.
Once a mediator writes out, UFCW said Dec. 10, a 14-day mandatory cooling-off period follows, during which time the union “will schedule and hold a strike vote.”
That said, the union added Monday it also “will be looking to return to the bargaining table to see if the company will improve their offer.”
Supplying customers in Canada and the U.S. as well as other export markets, Winnipeg-based Richardson’s Lethbridge plant has capacity to handle up to 700,000 tonnes of canola per year, following a $120 million expansion in 2017.
The Lethbridge plant includes a packaging facility at which canola oil is bottled and margarine and shortening are packaged. Its products are sold under the Canola Harvest and Wesson brands and to private-label and foodservice customers.
Richardson’s other oilseed facilities include its canola crush and refining plant at Yorkton, Sask. and its margarine plant at Oakville, Ont. — Glacier FarmMedia Network
