TORONTO-It would take the average Canadian supermarket worker 340 years to earn Loblaw CEO Galen Weston’s 2022 total compensation of $11.79 million, says Unifor.

“It is twisted that any analysis can find that billionaire grocery baron Galen Weston needs even more money when Loblaw refuses to pay many of its front-line workers a living wage and continues to deny full-time jobs.,” said Lana Payne, Unifor National President. “I understand the pressures that come with leadership, and you cannot for a second convince me that such an increase for one of Canada’s richest people is justified.”

According to Statistics Canada, the average grocery worker in Canada earned $18.97 per hour in 2022. Working a full 35-hour week, with annual earnings of $34,525, it would take more than 340 years to earn his 2022 earnings of $11.79 million.

“It is unjust to divert more money out of the pockets of workers under the notion of needing to incentivize Weston to continue working for his own family business,” said Sharon Walsh, Unifor Retail Sector Director. “Workers in his stores can’t afford the groceries they sell anymore, yet it seems that culturally we are fine with the idea of paying one person the equivalent of generations of workers’ wages in one year, every year.”

Weston received a whopping 55% raise last year on his Loblaw earnings alone. Loblaw also doled out millions more to both CFO Richard Dufresne, whose total compensation went from $1.8 million in 2021 to more than $5.4 million last year, and COO Robert Sawyer, whose total compensation was hiked from $7.4 million in 2021 to just over $9.3 million in 2022.

Compensation increases for the other major grocers are similarly out of touch with workers’ earnings.

Metro CEO Eric La Flèche was paid $5.3 million in total compensation in 2022, up from 2021 earnings of just over five million. Empire Company, which operates Safeway, Sobey’s, FreshCo, Foodland and other grocery brands, paid its CEO Michael Medline more than $8.6 million in total compensation last year, up from just over $7.4 million the year before.

“This year, Unifor grocery workers are at the bargaining table with Loblaw, Metro and Sobeys among others. Let’s see if these companies are as generous with their frontline workers as they are to their executives. We’re putting grocery barons on notice that they cannot continue to pay poverty wages with part-time status for full-time work,” said Payne.

Unifor represents 20,000 workers in Canada’s retail sector, including in supermarkets and warehouses owned and affiliated with Loblaw, Metro and Sobeys.

TORONTO –Unifor is demanding an update on the Competition Bureau’s civil investigation into whether Google has engaged in certain practices that harm competition in the online display advertising industry in Canada.

“Every day that Google is allowed to monopolize ad revenue, more harm is inflicted on the Canadian news industry, which has a negative impact on democracy as a whole,” said Unifor National President Lana Payne.

“This is an important issue and one that our union and media workers have our eyes on. We eagerly anticipate the results of the Competition Bureau’s work.”

The union wrote to Matthew Boswell of the Competition Bureau earlier this week to find out if there has been any movement within the agency to release its findings, since the probe began in October 2021.

The scope of the Competition Bureau investigation is to determine if Google is impeding the success of competitors, resulting in higher prices and reduced choice. Hindering innovation for advertising technology (ad tech) services, and harming advertisers, publishers and consumers.

The investigation includes an order from the Competition Bureau to have Google produce records and written information that are relevant to its inquiry.

Since the time the inquiry began, Canada’s crisis in the news media sector, particularly in newspapers, has continued to worsen. Unifor’s membership has been impacted with hundreds of local news operations shuttering as a result of dropping ad revenue.

As online advertising growth continues to outpace all other segments, traditional media – such as broadcast TV, radio, newspapers and magazines – have been fighting over a dwindling pool of advertising revenue. All the while, Google, Facebook and Amazon now account for 90% of internet ad spending in Canada.

Unifor’s members are very aware that advertising revenue has always been a fundamental building block in the news business.

“The list of dead newspapers reads like a roll call of regional and small-town Canada,” said Unifor Media Director Randy Kitt. “Notice of restructuring is sadly something media workers face on regular basis. News outlets are closing, consolidating and downsizing. We need Google to pay its fair share to save local news.”

In January 2023, the United States federal government and eight states sued Google, claiming the company has an illegal monopoly over online advertising.

In September 2022, a European Union court confirmed an earlier decision to impose a fine on Google and its parent company, Alphabet, for anti-competitive business practices, arising from the company’s use of its market dominance and smartphone technology to unfairly advantage its search engine services.

Based on the negative impacts on the Canadian media sector, and on the precedents set through legal proceedings in other jurisdictions, Unifor believes that Google is guilty of wrongdoing and the Competition Bureau should respond appropriately.

Unifor represents 12,000 journalists and media workers in television, newspapers, magazines, news websites and film production.

TORONTO—The Ontario government’s 2023 budget must reinvest in public health care and support workers and critical industries to make better use of recent windfalls, says Unifor.

“The Government of Ontario needs to think big about the goods and products we can build here in Ontario and can be beneficial to all Ontarians,” said Lana Payne, Unifor National President. “Unifor members in the province are ready to build the transit, transportation and manufacturing products of today and tomorrow, but leadership, support and investment like the government has shown in the auto sector is required.”

Unifor’s analysis of recent Ontario government spending reveals a government that is squandering windfall tax revenue and, according to the Financial Accountability Office, not spending enough to meet the government’s own health care programming goals.

“We are watching this budget carefully because we need substantial new provincial funds – not just the federal funding that was recently secured – to be dedicated to public health care,” said Naureen Rizvi, Unifor Ontario Regional Director. “Families are hurting, workers are being stretched to their limits. It’s time to see real investment in public services and infrastructure in Ontario.”

Unifor proposed a series of investments and targets to the Ontario government during pre-budget consultations. In addition to calls for investment in health care, including long-term care, the union also demanded a full repeal of the recently struck-down wage-suppressing Bill 124 and introduce true permanent paid sick days to replace the government’s expiring WSIB-funded program. Unifor is also calling for made in Canada investment in transit vehicles of the future.

Unifor also recommends:

• Re-invigorating public services and address staffing crises.
• Support the transition to electric vehicle manufacturing.
• Further expand funding for apprenticeship and skilled trades programs.
• Maintain and expand public transit service and infrastructure.
• Expand public, not for profit $10-a-day child care with improved wage scales and benefits for all child care workers.
• Implement a provincial pharmacare program.
• More direct support for workers through raising the minimum wage, introducing 10 paid sick days, and making it simpler for workers to unionize with legislation that enables card-based union certification.

These and other recommendations are outlined in Unifor’s pre-budget submission.