The union that represents workers at the Amazon warehouse in Laval says that at least thirty of them have just learned that they will lose their jobs.
Updated yesterday at 12:50 p.m.
Lia Levesque
The Canadian Press
Although it is common in the world of retail for layoffs to occur after the busy holiday season, the president of the CSN, Caroline Senneville, says she sees it as a measure of retaliation due to the unionization of these workers .
Amazon, however, refutes any malicious intent and instead explains the situation by an already planned end of employment, after the peak holiday season.
The retail giant accuses the CSN of spreading false information. “This allegation is false and the CSN is acting in a deliberately misleading manner,” commented Amazon spokesperson Barbara Agrait.
She assures that the employees concerned were hired for seasonal work and that their contracts clearly stipulated an end date of employment. “These people were hired as seasonal employees whose contracts stipulated clear end dates. We are grateful for all the work they have done to serve our customers this holiday season,” Amazon replied.
The president of the CSN, for her part, deplores that the union is not informed of the exact number of layoffs or the criteria used to determine who is laid off. She points out, for example, that it is not necessarily the last hires who are laid off, but sometimes those who were hired a few months ago.
“It is not abnormal for there to be layoffs after the busy holiday season; that’s one thing. But that’s the way they do it. We don’t even know about it,” laments Mme Senneville.
“The president of the union is obliged to call each of his 200 or so members to find out if they have been laid off or not. And so far, there are around thirty, but he hasn’t finished his calls,” reported Mme Senneville.
The union, accredited last May by the Administrative Labor Tribunal, is still negotiating its first collective agreement. Other negotiation meetings are planned for January. Regardless of the union, negotiating a first collective agreement is often a very long process.
Amazon challenged the unionization of its Laval warehouse before the Administrative Labor Tribunal, but the employer was dismissed last October. He then made it known that he was going to continue his fight.
