Workers arriving at Amazon’s Hamilton warehouse on Wednesday morning were greeted by a handful of people in bright yellow vests with brochures and signs saying “Amazon needs a union!”
Teamsters Local 879 members said they had stepped up their efforts after hearing some workers at the mountain’s implementation center who had expressed interest in unionizing.
Teamsters Local 879 members handed out brochures calling for a union at Amazon’s Hamilton warehouse on Wednesday. (Dan Taekema / CBC)
“We received some calls from Amazon workers to deal with the conditions inside, how they are treated,” said Jim Keeley, who is involved in organizing the union. “When they call, we come.”
The action outside the Hamilton Performance Center follows similar brochures elsewhere on Amazon in Ontario, Milton, Cambridge, Kitchener and London, according to Keeley.
“There’s a campaign across Canada with Teamsters,” he said.
The robotics facility, which the company called Canada’s “most technologically advanced execution center,” opened less than a month ago, with Amazon announcing in April that it plans to build three more facilities in Ontario in 2023.
The four centers will create a combined 4,500 “safe” jobs, the online retail giant said at the time, with at least 1,500 at Hamilton’s location.
Amazon spokesman Dave Bauer told the CBC earlier that most local warehouse workers will work full-time with a starting salary of $ 18.70 an hour.
Workers will also have medical, vision and dental coverage and other benefits such as an RRSP group plan, share rewards and performance bonuses, Bauer said.
Teamsters Local 879 member Steve Robertson handed out information brochures in front of Amazon’s Hamilton warehouse on Wednesday. (Dan Taekema / CBC)
Asked to comment on Hamilton’s union efforts, Amazon spokeswoman Rima Busufa said the company did not believe “unions are the best answer for our employees”, but the choice was up to workers.
“Our focus remains on working directly with our team to continue to make Amazon a great place to work,” Boussoufa wrote in an email.
Paul Gray describes Amazon as “one of Canada’s best-known anti-union companies.”
The labor research assistant at Brock University in St. Catharines, Ontario, cited reports of stress and an “incredibly” high rate of warehouse injuries due to Amazon quotas.
Although pay may be higher than other entry-level jobs, Gray said, it is lower than other warehouse work.
“Many of these workers say compensation can be relatively good, but that doesn’t justify working conditions that put them at risk.”
The union spokesman said he had heard the workers’ concerns
The lack of breaks, the shortening of free time and the increase in the time needed to cross the massive facility to use the toilet are among the concerns Kylie said he had heard from Hamilton staff.
He declined to be more specific, citing the need to protect workers.
The brochures include salary comparisons and contact information for Teamsters Local 879. (Dan Taekema / CBC)
Syndication efforts are under way on Amazon’s Canadian sites, including Montreal and Alberta, where Teamsters has applied for a second union on an Amazon site near Edmonton.
Keeley said news of a recent union vote by Amazon workers at the Staten Island facility in New York “sparked a lot” of interest in Canada.
The second vote for union failed earlier this month, a failure for organizers on Staten Island.
Gray, a professor of labor research, said one of the biggest challenges for people who want to join Amazon’s unions is the “huge turnover” that every plant tends to see.
The New York trade union drive teaches lessons about Canada’s efforts, including that the organizers were colleagues or people familiar with warehouse workers, he said.
Third parties, such as established unions, need to take this as a sign of building relationships over time so that employees feel that it is “a true collective voice of the workers themselves, not a group coming from outside,” Gray said. .
The campaign will not end in a week, the union said
Teamsters in Hamilton spent about an hour on Wednesday handing out brochures sharing pay comparisons and contact information for people driving in the parking lot and workers left by bus.
The union can help ensure “respect in the workplace” and lock in the details of the contract through a collective agreement, Keeley said.
“Right now, they’re individuals,” he said, pointing to the Amazon building and the people inside.
“With us we will protect you, we will take care of you and through collective bargaining we will do everything possible to get what you deserve.
Robertson distributes information leaflets to workers getting off the bus outside of Hamilton’s Amazon location. (Dan Taekema / CBC)
Keeley estimated that the small group of crews on the spot were handing out hundreds of pamphlets.
They were greeted with “a lot of thumbs” and questions about how to contact Teamsters, he added, describing it as a “very positive response”.
The action was for publicity, Keeley said, explaining that the union has plans to return and spread more information.
“This will be a campaign that will not end in a week,” he said. “We’re here until they say no or until we get a certificate.”
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