Canada vs. Wallmart
I need to come back to this, but the McLaughlin Report is on.
Quote of note:
It would be easy to overlook events in northern Quebec -- a region separated from the nearest big city by more than 100 miles of thickly wooded mountains seemingly planted with more moose crossing signs than houses, in a province known for its idiosyncratic labor laws -- as purely local.
But it's not. There has been angry name-calling by workers riven into pro-union and anti-union factions and accusations of intimidation by managers and threats of a lawsuit by the United Food and Commercial Workers Union.
And on Wednesday, Wal-Mart, referring to the strife, said the store was losing money and might have to close.
"If we are not able to reach a collective agreement that is reasonable and that allows the store to function efficiently and ultimately profitable, it is possible that the store will close," Andrew Pelletier, a spokesman at Wal-Mart Canada, said in an interview.
The buzz at the Jonquiere store is no accident. It is just the current focus in a larger chess game, waged by labor organizers in stores scattered across Canada -- including two other Wal-Marts in Quebec, where union spokesman Michael Forman said employees have also applied to the provincial labor board for union certification.
Regional Interest: Wal-Mart store in Quebec Province could be first to unionize
By Adam Geller, AP Business Writer | October 17, 2004
JONQUIERE, Quebec --The signs topping sales racks wear the same yellow smiley face, but promise "Chute de Prix," instead of price rollbacks. The boxes of Tide lining the shelves in housewares come packed with a bonus CD, just for Canadian stores, inviting shoppers to experience "la passion du Hockey."
But except for a few tweaks, the low-slung gray and blue Wal-Mart store off highway 70 could be almost any one of the retail Goliath's nearly 5,000 discount emporiums in the United States and eight other countries. And that's what worries executives at the Arkansas headquarters of Wal-Mart Stores Inc.
While still not a certainty, the 165 retirees, single moms, students and other hourly workers at this store 2 1/2 hours north of Quebec City could soon become the first anywhere to extract what the world's largest private employer insists its 1.5 million "associates" around the world neither want nor need -- a union contract. A government agency has certified the workers as a union and told the two sides to negotiate.
"One person against Wal-Mart cannot change anything," said Gaetan Plourde, a fiery 49-year-old sales clerk in the store's home electronics department, explaining simmering frustration over the store's pay, scheduling and other practices. "Wal-Mart wants to be rich, but it won't share."
