GFL workers vote 95% in favour of collective agreement
Katerina Georgieva | CBC News | Posted: January 13, 2019 7:18 PM | Last Updated: January 13, 2019
Deal includes a wage increase and pension plan
Garbage collection workers with Unifor Local 444 have voted 95 per cent in favour of a three-year collective agreement with Green For Life Environmental Services (GFL).
This is Unifor's first contract for garbage collection workers with GFL, a company the City of Windsor hired eight years ago.
Vice-president of Unifor Local 444 Doug Boughner says there was a good turn out at the vote on Sunday, and that everyone is pleased with how it went.
"Everybody was really happy," he said.
"The workers were very happy to hear the details of the agreement and I had no negative feedback to be quite honest."
Wage gains and benefits
The new deal includes a wage gain of 45-cents per hour for each year of the agreement. So, that amounts to an increase of $1.35 per hour over the life of the agreement, Boughner explained.
Employees currently make between $16 to $21 per hour.
"We got a pension plan covered in the collective agreement. They got a good benefit package covered in the collective agreement and just some general work rules they have to follow now. So it really went well."
Boughner said this has been a long time in the making, and that the union has been bargaining on and off since May.
"I think we addressed most issues. Obviously you don't get everything you want first time around but we were able to make inroads in everything. And we'll improve, in three years we'll go back at it again."
Back in November, the workers had voted in favour of strike action, if required. Boughner said he's happy it didn't come to that.
The city has saved more than $4 million since outsourcing garbage collection eight years ago. It pays GFL $69 per tonne for solid waste collection and $142,000 a month for recyclables.