Quebec’s labour tribunal has given union accreditation to workers at an Amazon warehouse in Laval, Que., a first in Canada.

Workers at the DXT4 warehouse, located in Laval, a suburb north of Montreal, had been working toward unionizing with the Confédération des syndicats nationaux (CSN) for two years.

The CSN filed an application with Quebec’s Administrative Labour Tribunal on April 19 to represent some 200 employees. The decision came down Friday.

Caroline Senneville, the CSN’s president, said employees were dissatisfied with what they described as a hectic work pace, low wages, and inadequate health and safety measures.

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    6 months ago

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    Workers at the DXT4 warehouse, located in Laval, a suburb north of Montreal, had been working toward unionizing with the Confédération des syndicats nationaux (CSN) for two years.

    The company also claimed some sections of Quebec’s labour code go against the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms by using membership cards instead of a secret ballot vote.

    Amazon is not the first company to argue that employees should undergo a voting process to unionize instead of using member cards, which is typically an intimidation tactic, said Senneville of the CSN.

    In June 2022, the CSN filed a complaint with the labour board against a different Amazon warehouse in Montreal’s Lachine borough after posters it said were meant to discourage people from signing union cards went up.

    Barry Eidlin, an associate professor of sociology at McGill University with a focus on labour policy, said workers likely won’t see major improvements in their working conditions any time soon.

    “This is one fulfillment centre in a large international network of a global company, so it’s going to take a lot more than one warehouse unionizing to actually make a difference in the wages and working conditions at Amazon,” he said.

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