What Cargill workers want - CBC.ca

On a cold, windy November day, Freddy Vasquez cuts a small figure as the massive Cargill meat-processing plant near High River, Alta., looms behind him.

"Now hiring," reads a highway billboard propped up outside the plant, offering sign-on bonuses of $500 for day shifts and $600 for nights.

Hard hat on and mask affixed, Vasquez steps into a vehicle parked on the side of the highway. He says hello, takes off his hat and sighs deeply.

"I've got a massive headache today," he says. "I go to work with headaches. I come home with headaches."

Inside the plant behind Vasquez, union workers are voting in person on a new offer of settlement from the company. Among other measures, the offer features wage boosts and increased employee benefits.

"What we're asking is that, at least, they recognize what we're doing," says Alain Mendoza, who works on the harvest floor.

"All those things people don't want to do, we're the ones doing it."

For workers who have been without a contract since December 2020, this is a critical decision that, if accepted, will chart the course for employees at the plant for six years.

Cargill union workers haven't had a contract since December 2020. (Jamie Hopkins/CBC)

If this contract is rejected — and scuttlebutt around the plant suggests it will be — then the company and the union will go back to the drawing board.

Workers are interested in a raise, of course, but this contract represents something more important.

They say it's an opportunity to address years of unrealistic expectations driven by production that have led to injury and alleged mistreatment by superiors that have made many feel a sense of indignity.

All of this lands in the shadow of a massive COVID-19 outbreak in May 2020 that ripped through this plant, left hundreds sick and three dead. It colours all of the negotiations to come and remains extremely present to the people who experienced it.

This bargaining is a chance for employees to make their real, deeply felt frustrations heard, says Sean Tucker, an associate professor of human resource management at the University of Regina who specializes in worker safety.

"This dispute has the potential to lead to real improvement for workers at the High River plant, but also set a pattern for meat-processing workers at other plants in Alberta and across Canada," he says. "That's what I'll be watching closely."

There are sticking points. In the aftermath of the COVID-19 outbreak, workers aren't happy about the lack of paid sick leave in the proposed contract.

As a part of that outbreak, at least 950 staff tested positive for COVID-19. Two workers — 67-year-old Hiep Bui and 51-year-old Benito Quesada — died of COVID-19, as did Armando Sallegue, a worker's 71-year-old father.

The new contract proposes that a so-called "COVID bonus" of $1,200 will be paid out to all active employees — but that's contingent on the union and the company resolving a number of pending grievances tied to the plant shutdown last spring.

They'll need to come to an agreement soon or workers will go on strike in the cold of an Alberta December.

This poster, advocating for strike action, was placed on a locker inside the Cargill meat-processing plant in November. (Submitted by name withheld)

There's no question that a strike at this plant would have serious implications for Prairie ranchers, many of whom have been struggling with drought and high feed costs. Cargill provides around 40 per cent of all beef processing in Canada.

But the impacts of the COVID-19 outbreak that infected nearly half the workforce, as well as hundreds of family members and other close contacts, can't be forgotten.

Last year, after employees first began to test positive for COVID-19, some told CBC News they continued to work in close proximity despite physical distancing measures put in place by the company, adding that Cargill pressured them to return to work even after they contracted COVID-19.

The outbreak is the subject of a police investigation, although no charges have been laid. The company is also the target of a class-action lawsuit, the allegations of which have yet to be tested in court.

Workers say challenges at the plant existed before the COVID-19 outbreak and persist now.

They allege that production speeds are unrealistic and lead to injury and that worker shortages have put undue pressure on current employees. Others say they have felt harassed and disrespected by superiors while at work, sometimes being yelled or sworn at.

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What Cargill workers want - CBC.ca
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