August 17, 2021

TORONTO – The layoffs being announced at Bell Media at its Queen Street location today, resulting in 27 jobs lost and another 22 jobs being reclassified, shows the need to level the playing field as foreign Internet broadcasters operate outside existing regulations.

“The tremendous financial pressure placed on Canadian broadcasters because of Internet giants getting a free ride in this country leads to these kinds of so-called efficiencies,” Unifor National President Jerry Dias said.

“We need legislation to stop this tremendous pressure. The previous Bill C-10 was aimed at leveling the playing field between Canadian broadcasters and behemoth foreign counterparts Netflix, Amazon and others.”

Bill C-10, which died on the order paper with the election call, would have given the CRTC the power to dedicate a stream of industry funding for local TV news with strict conditions to tie it to a headcount of journalists and media workers.

Unifor is calling on all parties in the current federal election to commit to making companies such as Netflix and Amazon to pay their fair share to ensure television and news content is created in Canada, just as Canadian broadcasters must do.

“These layoffs are a result of downsizing and tech change. We’re told no programming will be lost with these cuts, but there’s no way the quality of that programming can be the same and the pressure for more cuts will only continue until action is taken.”

Unifor continues to meet with Bell Media to mitigate the job loss and the impact on our members.

Unifor is Canada’s largest union in the private sector and represents 315,000 workers in every major area of the economy. The union advocates for all working people and their rights, fights for equality and social justice in Canada and abroad, and strives to create progressive change for a better future.

August 24, 2021

TORONTO – Unifor National President Jerry Dias is calling on the prime minister and the Ontario premier to state publicly that there will be no government money for De Havilland if Unifor members are not building the Dash-8 airplane.

“I’m reaching out to Justin Trudeau today and saying Justin you better come out today to say that not one nickel of federal government money will ever see the pockets of Longview if they try to screw the 700 families in Downsview,” Dias told a rally of striking De Havilland workers and supporters today.

Members of Unifor Locals 112 and 673 have been on strike since July 27. Parent company Longview Aviation Capital announced earlier this year it would no longer build the new Dash 8-400 aircraft at the Downsview plant. Dias said the Dash-8 program has long relied on government support, and that both levels of government need to make it clear those days are over without a fair deal.

“The province didn’t put hundreds of millions of dollars into this program so the jobs could go to Alberta,” Dias said.

In Thunder Bay, Premier Doug Ford called moving the Dash-8 out of Ontario “disgusting” and vowed to fight any such move.

Speakers at the rally pointed to the 700 families who rely on the plant to support their families, and called on Longview to return to the bargaining table.

“You might have bought the De Havilland name, but it was the workers who built that name,” said Local 673 President Maryellen McIlmoyle. Local 112 President Scott McIlmoyle said these have been “by far the most frustrating” negotiations he has ever encountered. “Longview has folks at the table who can’t make decisions,” he said.

Despite a court injunction limiting picketing last week, Dias said no one will be allowed into the plant until a deal is reached.

Unifor is Canada’s largest union in the private sector and represents 315,000 workers in every major area of the economy. The union advocates for all working people and their rights, fights for equality and social justice in Canada and abroad, and strives to create progressive change for a better future.

Unifor discussed the crisis in long-term care in a meeting with Ontario Long-term Care Minister Rod Phillips on August 9, 2021.

“I extended my challenge to spend a shift in a long-term care home to Minister Phillips,” said Unifor National President Jerry Dias. “We need to fix the crisis in long-term care and hopefully spending a shift with me will help push the government to make progressive changes for residents and workers.”

Unifor secured the meeting to raise important issues facing Ontario health care workers, outline key concerns and share the union’s recommendations after sending a letter to Minister Phillips.

Dias was joined at the meeting by Assistant to National President Katha Fortier, President of Local 302 Nancy McMurphy and Unifor Director of Health Care Andy Savela. The Unifor delegation raised the following issues to the Minister:

• The failure of for-profit care.
• The need to move immediately to four hours of daily care per resident.
• Lack of any action from most operators, including creating full-time work or any meaningful effort to increase staffing or address the staffing crisis.
• The trauma experienced by many of our members working in long-term care and the immediate need to focus on retention.
• The need to require operators to provide 70% full-time work.
• Growing use of the sub-classification of PSW’s that have been created by many employers.
• Lack of transparency from operators in reporting hours of care as well as percentage of full-time workers, use and cost of agency workers and reliance and cost of overtime.
• No plan to attract the thousands of PSW’s who have left the sector to return with decent working conditions.
• Emergency orders that still override our members’ collective agreement rights and are simply used to compensate for lack of staff.
• Fair pay for ALL LTC workers.
• For-profit operators fight to deny employees maintenance of proxy pay equity as well as the efforts from Bass and Associates to supress wages over the last decade.
• Concerns with OPSWA as a legitimate representative for PSW’s.
• General concerns on pandemic pay, leaving other workers behind and issues raised in this letter to Premier Ford
• Retirement home challenges. (while this falls under the MOH, many residents in retirement homes are actually waiting for LTC)

“The crisis in long-term care existed long before COVID-19 in terms of proper staffing levels, the number of full-time jobs, the ability to earn a living wage and the ability to provide residents with the amount of daily care that they require,” said Dias. “We stressed to Minister Philips that residents and workers cannot wait years for policies, including four hours of daily care, to be implemented. Clear action is needed and it’s needed now,” said Dias.

The Minister noted that he has been attending surprise inspections with compliance officers regularly in nursing homes, speaking directly with the inspectors and the staff.

The Minister and his staff indicated that their immediate priorities include enforcement and transparency, but also said that they anticipate significant issues with timing and still envision a multi-year process. They did clearly state that the four hours of care will only include direct care from nurses and PSW’s. They also stated they are working on a plan to extricate the sector from the emergency orders but did not give a firm timeline.  The government indicated legislation on the four hours of care could be expected mid-fall and that Unifor is welcome to participate in that process. They do have plans to include transparency on several items including resident and family satisfaction, hours of care and fulltime work.

Unifor is expressing solidarity with the people and workers of Afghanistan, as news reports continue to paint a dire and desperate situation for the country’s people. Over the past few weeks, the Taliban have advanced across Afghanistan, which has caused a rise in violence and threats against citizens.

“Our hearts are with the people and workers in Afghanistan, as well as their family members here in Canada and across the world,” said Jerry Dias, Unifor National President. “In such times, our world can feel so small, and our lives connected – our solidarity is needed with those facing violence.”

Decades of military presence in Afghanistan have resulted in millions of displaced people, including many who have come to Canada as refugees. Unifor joins thousands of Canadians with loved ones in Afghanistan in calling on the government to continue providing direct support for people seeking to leave Afghanistan, as well as open up safe asylum routes for people wishing to come to Canada.

“It is our responsibility, as a country who participated in the war in Afghanistan, to welcome and offer safe asylum to those fleeing its consequences regardless of if they have worked with Canada,” said Lana Payne, Unifor National Secretary-Treasurer. “The Taliban may say they have changed, but their recent actions remind Afghans of the same repressive regime of the past. Our thoughts go out especially to women and girls on the ground in Afghanistan as the situation evolves.”

Unifor also encourages all candidates running in the Canadian federal election to address the situation in Afghanistan and pledge support. Unifor members are encouraged to contact their local candidates and encourage them to be in solidarity with the people and workers of Afghanistan.

In solidarity, Unifor National and Unifor’s Social Justice fund are donating $10,000 to International Media Support in support of Afghanistan’s journalists.

Earlier this week, the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) launched an international solidarity campaign with Afghan journalists as the threat of violence grows and media are forced to close in the wake of the Taliban taking control of large parts of the country. Unifor supports this campaign and encourages workers in Canada to amplify the campaign