British Columbia Labour Relations Board Decision Preserves Bargaining Rights

This summer, the British Columbia Labour Relations Board ruled in favor of building trades unions and members when it dismissed all three requests for relief by two general contractors, PCL and Farmer, to get out of their collective bargaining agreements. The contractors claimed that all workers in their employ should be merged into one bargaining unit, thereby nullifying the bargaining rights of all the affected building tradesworkers.

A decision for the employers would have been disastrous for BAC and other tradesworkers in the province. A relieved and delighted Rob Tuzzi, President of Local 2 British Columbia, said that in addition to the favourable ruling, “an added benefit was the level of cooperation and teamwork among the building trades unions in seeing this through to a successful conclusion.” This assault on unions and workers has been stopped – for now, but, the employer groups are continuing their assault on the rights of employees to freely select a union.