FPI can fly under new management: union head

The breakup of Fishery Products International's assets could wind up bringing greater stability to Newfoundland communities where FPI does business, a union leader says.

Earle McCurdy, president of the Fish, Food and Allied Workers union said his members do not oppose change, so long as a new operator has the best interests of workers in mind.

"[FPI's] results haven't been very good— there's been turmoil, there's been chaos, there's been plant closures, there's been controversy," McCurdy told CBC News.

"It doesn't make a whole lot of sense to me— in the history of all that turmoil— for everyone to jump back and say, 'Oh no, we got to keep it all exactly how it was.' Well, as it was, frankly, wasn't very good," McCurdy said.

The FFAW has been locked for more than a year in a bargaining struggle with the management team of St. John's-based FPI, which has failed to extract a wage rollback of $2 per hour from its unionized workers.

The issue was referred to a conciliator. McCurdy said he hopes the dispute can soon be resolved.

FPI's current leadership, led by Nova Scotia investor John Risley, took command of the company in a 2001 hostile takeover.

Four companies have emerged as suitors for FPI's assets, although their pursuits do not overlap.

Nova Scotian seafood heavyweight High Liner Foods, for instance, is interested in FPI's value-added production plants and its U.S.-based marketing arm.

Three other companies— the Barry Group, Ocean Choice and a team formed by FPI managers— are pursuing other assets, including FPI's Newfoundland-based groundfish and shellfish operations.

Province has final say on asset sales

Tom Rideout, Newfoundland and Labrador's fisheries minister, says the province will need to approve transfers of assets, because of controls enshrined in the FPI Act, a provincial law created to govern the former Crown corporation.

Rideout said while the province cannot tell FPI what to do, he said he prefers the St. John's-based Ocean Choice bid because it involves a wide variety of quotas.

"If you have all of that in one company, it would seem to me that the economic base of the company would be strengthened," Rideout told CBC News.

FPI is still a key player in the international seafood market, although the company is much smaller than it wasin its peak production years in the late 1980s.

At that time, the company had 8,600 direct employees. Its workforce in more recent times has dipped below 2,500, and its groundfish plants have been idle during its struggle over concessions with the FFAW.

FPI was created in 1984 from the ashes of three failing companies. The original owners were the federal and provincial governments and the Bank of Nova Scotia. The company was privatized in 1987.

FPI says it would like to decide on how it will sell its assets soon. However, a decision may still take weeks or even months, because of a requirement for provincial government approval.