Conciliator recommends binding arbitration in liquor strike

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This article was published 17/08/2023 (1183 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The Manitoba Government and General Employees’ Union is calling the pay of executives at Manitoba Liquor and Lotteries a double standard.

During a press conference on Aug. 10, MGEU president Kyle Ross said the pay MBLL executives received was more than what frontline workers were being offered at the negotiating table.

“Once again we see that Premier Stefanson’s restrictive wage freeze mandate doesn’t apply to those making top dollar,” said MGEU President Kyle Ross. “This is the double standard we’ve been talking about. If two percent increases are not good enough for the Premier and her Cabinet along with MBLL Senior Executives, it’s not good enough for our members either.”

Under the Public Sector Compensation Disclosure Act, MBLL must report total compensation paid to employees who earn more than $75,000 a year. The MGEU noted the pay for two of MBLL’s top executives, CEO Gerry Sul and executive vice-president of liquor and cannabis operations Robert Holmberg. Between 2018 and 2022, each received a 16 percent increase in their pay which translates to a four percent annual increase. Sul has a salary of $249,498, while Holmberg has a salary of $246,807. The figures reported represent total compensation, including regular salary, overtime, retirement and severance payments, vacation payouts and other benefits. By contrast, MGEU members were limited to a pay increase of just 1.75 percent over those same four years or 0.4 percent annually.

“It’s not just that our members are being asked to accept increases well below those taken by Premier Stefanson and her ministers. It’s also that they were required to fall behind so much during their last contract,” added Ross. “That’s why they are standing up for fairness in this round of bargaining. Hearing that their bosses took 16 percent while they were required to take just 1.75 percent last round just strengthens our resolve to get fair wage increases this time.”

Right now, the MBLL is offering two percent annually over four years. The current base pay for a MBLL employee is $14.91 an hour. Come October when the provincial minimum wage increases to $15.30 that starting MBLL wage will increase to $17.68. After 1,000 hours that wage increases to $18.34 and after 2,000 hours it goes up to $19.08, according to an infographic by the MBLL.

Signing bonuses for employees who worked between 330 and 749 hours in the year prior to ratification would receive $600, those who worked up to 1,499 hours would receive $800 and those who worked more than 1,500 hours would receive $1,000.

The infographic further shows the MBLL offering a recruitment and retention special adjustment of one percent during the fourth year of the agreement.

An MGEU spokesperson said those aspects of MBLL’s offer were all publicly available to members and were soundly rejected.

“At member meetings in recent weeks, we’ve encouraged members to go have a look at it, so they can see it in the employer’s own words,” the spokesperson said.

“The employer’s problem isn’t that our members don’t know what’s in their offer. Their problem is that our members don’t like it.”

MGEU said the 24.55 percent wage increase ladder described by MBLL would apply only to seasonal workers and new hires, less than 20 percent of the union’s membership, and only if those members stayed employed with MBLL for four years. The vast majority of permanent long-term members would get a four-year total wage increase of eight or nine percent, the union said.

MBLL has said it has “repeatedly” asked MGEU to put the current offer to a vote. The first offer from MBLL to MGEU included yearly wage increases of 1.5 percent, 1.75 percent and two per cent over four years, which was met with an “overwhelming” vote in favour of a strike mandate, MGEU said.

MBLL offered its current wage increase of two percent on July 13 and strike action began July 19.

The MGEU spokesperson called bonuses and pay bumps a “nasty tactic” against a strike focused on improving wages for all staff across the board.

“This dispute is about general wage increases that apply to all members. Signing bonuses, pay-grade adjustments for specific groups of workers are not general wage increases,” he said.

“Those things are typically part of deals, employers often want to try to buy off particular groups of members, but our members told us at the ratification meetings — we hear it every day on the picket line — that’s not what this dispute is about.”

-With files from Malak Abas and Danielle Da Silva