POINT TUPPER, N.S. - Workers who worked at an idled paper mill in Cape Breton have started receiving calls informing them if they can expect to be recalled. Pacific West Commercial Corp. is only planning on restarting the NewPage mill's supercalendered machine - not the newsprint line - and is slashing the workforce to 229 unionized employees from more than 500.
In the News
Workers at idled Cape Breton paper mill receiving notices from company
Published
Sydney/Cape Breton Post
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05/18/12
Union, Norampac talk turkey
Published
The Trentonian
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05/15/12
The union representing 100 workers at Trenton’s Norampac mill is close
to voting on a tentative agreement, QMI Agency has learned.
But, while both sides in the on-going labour dispute met Monday morning,
company officials declined to say anything about the labour talks.
The morning meeting was confirmed by Dave Moffat, Ontario region vice
president of the Communications, Energy and Papermakers Union (CEP).
Workers losing trust in company
Published
The Western Star
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05/15/12
CORNER BROOK - "Even kids know when it is wrong to hold out on somebody."
That is the quote Bruce Randell, president Local 242 of the
Communications, Energy and Paperworkers union, used Monday to describe
how mill workers were feeling about the latest development to come from
the eight-week process of determining whether to grant Kruger a
five-year extension to make up for a deficit in pension plans.
NewPage workers ask for legislative pension changes
Published
CBC
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05/04/12
Workers and retirees at the shuttered NewPage Port Hawkesbury paper mill
in Cape Breton are asking the Nova Scotia government for some
legislative changes to help soften the blow from their underfunded
pension plans.
CRTC asked to create standards for phone contracts
Published
Toronto Star
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05/04/12
Canada’s telecom giants want a national set of standards to govern
cellphone contracts, saying emerging provincial legislation amounts to a
patchwork that would not protect consumers in all parts of the country.
BCE Inc., Rogers Communications Inc. and Telus Corp. along with the
Public Interest Advocacy Centre have called on the telecom regulator to
craft a federal consumer protection code that would apply to all mobile
device customers in Canada.
Labour council honours fallen workers at memorial service
Published
Lake of the Woods Enterprise
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04/29/12
Gathering recalls long time contributions by injured workers advocate
Ernie Craik
The Kenora District Labour Council hosted the Annual Day of Mourning
memorial service to honour workers suffering injuries, illness or killed
on the job at Lake of the Woods Cemetery, April 28.
The ceremony was attended by a gathering of labour council and union
representatives, city and provincial officials and supporters.
Negotiation attempts collapse
Published
CTV National Affairs
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04/27/12
What are student protesters trying to achieve? Guillaume Bertrand, from a student group, Gaetan Menard, from the Communications, Energy and Paperworkers Union, and Denis Belisle, of the Federation of Quebec University Professors, discuss. Watch it on CTV News
Direct Energy workers on strike
Published
Canadian Press
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04/18/12
Hundreds of Direct Energy workers walked off the job Tuesday night after contract talks between the company and the union broke off.
CEP Local 975 called a strike just before midnight after the company imposed work conditions.
The union said Direct Energy is pushing for "sweeping concessions," including wage cutbacks of up to 25 per cent. "The company is refusing to pay a shift premium for evening and weekend work, which is when customers prefer to have their servicing performed," spokesman Dave Moffat said in a statement.
Workers vote to accept contract deal with pulp and paper company
Published
Canadian Press
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04/18/12
PORT HAWKESBURY, N.S. - More than 85 per cent of union members at an
idled Nova Scotia paper mill voted Tuesday to accept a contract deal
from the operation's prospective buyer.
Archie MacLachlan of the Communications Energy and Paperworkers union
said that 85.6 per cent of those who voted accepted the offer from
Pacific West Commercial Corp.
"We asked for them to vote for it and 85 per cent is a good endorsement
of the recommendation," he said following the late vote, adding that not
all will be working at the mill if it reopens.
NewPage employees to decide on new contract
Published
CBC
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04/12/12
The British Columbia firm offering to buy the shuttered NewPage Port
Hawkesbury mill in Cape Breton wants to cut the unionized workforce in half.
Pacific West Commercial Corp. sent mill employees an ultimatum via the
internet on Thursday and said if a new collective agreement cannot be
reached, the company will withdraw its bid to buy the mill.
Letter to the Editor: They didn't do it for us; I doubt they will for you
Published
The Fredericton Daily Gleaner
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04/04/12
RE: EX MLA Pension Cuts:
As president of the CEP Local 29 located in Edmundston, I simply had to
send in my two cents and represent my views and the views of my members.
I am quite perplexed to see Mr. Jeannot Volpé coming out of the woodwork
and crying out injustice because his pension got cut by one third.
11 business leaders react to the federal budget
Published
CBCnews.ca
---
03/30/12
The following are some of the comments about Ottawa's latest budget:
Ken Neumann, national director for Canada, United Steelworkers
"Eliminating the penny won't distract from the Harper Conservatives'
deep cuts to important public services, jobs and retirement security,
the United Steelworkers (USW) union says."
"The Harper government claims it has introduced a jobs budget, but it
actually projects a higher unemployment rate this year than last year.
Conservative cuts will directly eliminate 19,200 jobs from the delivery
Brian Topp's thank you note
Published
Sun Media
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03/26/12
NDP leadership hopeful Brian Topp issued a thank you letter on Monday. Topp came in second in the party’s leadership race behind Quebec MP Thomas Mulcair, which wrapped up on Saturday in Toronto.
Dear friends,
I have said it on Twitter and on Facebook, and now I’d like to say it in a letter to you:
Thank you so much for your friendship and support during the 2012 leadership contest, just concluded.
When it’s over, it’s over. And like all New Democrats all across Canada, there must be only one thing on all of our minds from now on — unity behind our new leader, Tom Mulcair; strength; and an absolute focus on the task at hand, which is to offer Canadians a better government.
Letter to the Editor: Time to step up
Published
The Telegram (St. John's)
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03/17/12
"Tell the truth and shame the devil." The mother of a friend used that
expression with her children in Grand Falls- Windsor. No doubt just one
of many aphorisms lovingly voiced to inculcate honesty into the value
fabric of children.
It breeds integrity.
Union working with retirees
Published
The Western Star
---
03/07/12
CORNER BROOK -- Bruce Randell knows there are concerns out there over the pension plan
for workers and retirees of Corner Brook Pulp and Paper.
"Obviously, we're worried about the pensions," said the president of
Local 242 of the Communications, Energy and Paperworkers Union.
"There's more pensioners out there now than there are people working in
the mill."
Monitor overseeing Nova Scotia mill sale says promised provincial money needed
Published
Canadian Press
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03/06/12
HALIFAX - The $5 million that the Nova Scotia government has promised
for the NewPage Port Hawkesbury paper mill will be needed to keep it in
a semi-ready state, says a report by the court-appointed monitor
overseeing the sale of the operation.
Union files $11.7-million lawsuit against Fraser Papers directors over pensions
Published
Canadian Press
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03/01/12
OTTAWA - The Communications Energy and Paperworkers Union of Canada said
Wednesday it has filed an $11.7-million lawsuit against directors of
now-defunct pulp and paper company Fraser Papers.
The union said in a release it filed its suit in Quebec superior court
on Tuesday, and that futher legal actions on behalf of its New Brunswick
members will be announced in the coming weeks.
Unions still influential in NDP race
Published
The Chronicle Herald
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02/24/12
OTTAWA — Trade unions remain a force to contend with in the NDP leadership contest, even though they’ve been stripped of their financial clout and voting heft.
They provide candidates with access to their thousands of members and lend them considerable organizational muscle.
They also bring moral suasion to bear on party members who still cherish the NDP’s traditional ties to trade unions, which were founding partners in the party 51 years ago.
Former Fraser Paper workers hold rally
Published
Telegraph-Journal (NB)
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02/24/12
About a dozen former Fraser Papers employees from New Brunswick and Quebec drove through the night to Toronto where they held a rally on Wednesday to protest pension cuts.
The Victims of Brookfield, a group of retirees from former Fraser operations in Edmundston and Thurso, Que., say that up to 40 per cent of their pensions were cut as a result of the restructuring of Fraser Papers.
CTV Ottawa faces news of more staff reductions in June
Published
Ottawa Citizen
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02/17/12
OTTAWA — A week after Bell Media laid off 16 on-air staff at CTV Ottawa
and at four of its radio stations, the city’s top-ranked television
station was hit by another round of staff cuts Friday.
At an afternoon meeting at the Market Mall building, CTV Ottawa
employees were told that management is looking to eliminate 20 full-time
and 15 part-time jobs by mid-June.
