The British Columbia Labor Relations Board has rejected an offer from the Amazon electronic commerce giant to revoke a previous decision that granted the union certification to workers in a center of Delta, BC.
A panel of the Labor Relations Board ruled a decision dated Tuesday that it agrees with the original decision of the Board in July that ordered the corrective certification due to the hiring of Amazon “to frustrate the request for certification of the union.”
The panel says that the evidence presented by Unifor showed “a deliberate decision of the employer” of increasing its list of employees to dilute union support during its impulse of membership.
The decision also says that the Amazon movement to intentionally fill in its employee list and then use it to argue that the union does not meet the threshold for certification “is manipulating the list of employees to avoid certification.”
Amazon workers in Delta, BC, were certified to unionize on Friday, in a failure of the BC Labor Relations Board. Gavin McGarrigle, Western Regional Director of Unifor, says he is optimistic that the legislation will force Amazon to the negotiating table.
In a statement, Amazon spokeswoman Eileen Hards says that the company plans to appeal the decision again and “determine the next correct steps” once there is a final decision on the appeal.
Amazon had asked the Board of Labor Relations to reconsider its original decision of July, and the last ruling says that the company argued that the last panel of the Board made an error when applying labor laws to the case, as well as in the award of the corrective certification to the Union.
The company had argued that the evidence showed that “there was an operational need for additional personnel”, while what was described as a “generalized anti-union campaign” was protected by the rights of freedom of expression of the employer.
The panel did not agree.
“In our opinion, the original decision adopts the correct approach, which is to consider the behavior of the employer as a whole,” says the decision.
Citing precedent, the panel writes: “We observe that the types of activities in which the employer participates in the present case are the classic characteristics of an interference in the formation or selection of a union.”
The panel says that Amazon’s move knowingly and incorrectly “the list of employees is” atrocious enough “to justify their original decision to order the certification of the union.
“From our perspective, the intentional filling of a list of employees in order to undermine an organization campaign is an even more fundamental attack on the associative rights of its employees,” says the last decision.
In a statement, the national president of Unifor, Lana Payne, says that the decision is a “message” to BC employers not to interfere in the unionization “or suffer the consequences.”
The regional director of Unifor Western Gavin McGarrigle told CBC News that the ruling showed that it doesn’t matter how big the workplace, employees had a right under the letter to unionize.
“Clearly, Amazon seriously interfered with that right. And, therefore, he has to enter the collective bargaining,” he said.
“End the farce and obtain a collective agreement for these workers.”
McGarrigle said the union was now talking to workers about what they would like to see in a contract.
Hards, the Amazon spokesman, says that the decision is “incorrect about the facts and law” and deprives workers of their “right to make an informed decision.”
