NDP Leader Alison Coffin was taken aback when she found out that the Labour Relations Board released signed union cards to an employer. She calls this a trust-breaking mistake that was completely avoidable. On August 28th, the NL Carpenter’s Union Local 579 of the Atlantic Canada Regional Council of Carpenters, Millwrights and Allied Workers filed an official complaint with the Newfoundland and Labrador Privacy Commissioner calling for an investigation.
“These workers’ legal right to unionize has been completely undermined by this egregious mistake,” Coffin said today. “For years the NDP has been calling for card check certification to be re-instated in this province to prevent the very issue we’re seeing today.” Card check is a process by which if a threshold of workers lawfully submit signed union cards to the Labour Relations Board, no further vote is required.
Labrador-West MHA, and labour critic, Jordan Brown says this cannot be resolved with a simple apology.
“Fundamentally, we need to know how this could have happened,” said Brown. “This isn’t an ‘oops, sorry’ scenario. This absolutely cannot happen again. The result of this is workers in Marystown who supported unionizing now have to fear reprimands from their employer. This is unacceptable.” Brown said today.
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For further information, contact Eddy St. Coeur, Director of Communications, NDP Caucus at 729-2137 (o), 693-9172 (c), or eddystcoeur@gov.nl.ca