| I’m Jeff Traeger, president of UFCW, Local 832 and the Lead Negotiator. In this round of talks between your union and your employer, Loblaw Companies. We have had a bit of a break from the bargaining table, having not been at the table since July 7. We are back on Monday, August 28, and we’re going to be bargaining pretty much straight through until your contract expires a month later, on September 28. We will also be calling for a strike vote to take place on September 8-10. Now, the reason we’re taking this strike vote is because we are heading into the final stretch of bargaining and we need to send a message to Loblaw so your bargaining committee can get the best possible deal we can for our members at Loblaw. They’ve heard from the bargaining committee. They’ve heard from me as lead negotiator. Now it’s time for them to hear you! |
| If you have any difficulty with the voting process, the letter that you will have received will have the name and phone number of your union representative. Just contact them if you have any issues with calling in or voting online and they can certainly help you out. |
| It’s very important that we get a strong strike mandate from our Loblaw members. If you’re someone who wants to send a message to your employer that you are prepared to go on strike to get a fair offer from them, then you should vote yes. And if you’re someone who is not sure that you want to go on strike right now but still wants to get the best offer possible, you should also vote yes. That will give your committee the power at the bargaining table to bring you that best possible deal and you will get another vote. So voting yes to the strike mandate vote will not put you out on the street. It will help your committee to bring you the best possible contract, which you will get an opportunity to vote on in October. So we will be having regular video updates from the bargaining table from myself and Secretary Treasurer, Marie Buchan, and my executive assistant, Ron Allard. We will be providing you those updates as we’re at the bargaining table. So stay tuned to this website for further information. And hopefully by September 28th we can bring some good news to our members. Thank you. |