Bank workers seek to unionize

(December 22, 2004) TD Canada Trust employees in Sudbury, Ontario are interested in joining a union. The United Steelworkers of Canada filed an application to represent the workers on Tuesday after an “overwhelming” majority said they would support the move to unionize.

The 100 staff work at eight branches in the northern Ontario city, and include bank tellers and in-house financial advisors.

The employees want to address a number of issues, says Steelworkers’ Ontario/Atlantic director Wayne Fraser, such as job security, wages, benefits, pensions, sales objectives and seniority.

“TD Canada Trust employees are dedicated, loyal high performers, [who] love working with the public and care about their company and their clients. It may be traditionally a prestigious, pleasant environment, but it is also a high stress environment,” Fraser explains.

The union says that other TD branches and other banks are following the campaign with interest and that more applications are expected in 2005.

“We’ve been getting a lot of interest from bank employees recently,” Fraser added in an interview. “Banks are huge businesses making lots of money, but they’re not really passing on those benefits to employees. That’s why you’re getting a strong interest for unionization.”

The closing of bank branches in small towns is one of the major issues, Fraser says. “Workers with lots of seniority are being thrown out in the streets.”

The Steelworkers union already represents about 3,000 financial services workers in Canada, mostly in credit unions, but also in a number of CIBC branches in smaller centres across the country.

In Sudbury, Fraser expects to have the union certified within 30 days, After that, they will negotiate a collective bargaining agreement with TD Canada Trust, a process that could take up to three months.

“We’ll be dealing with the [TD] head office at some point, but there’s been no contact yet.”

Filed by Doug Watt, Advisor.ca, doug.watt@advisor.rogers.com