Union wants tenures taken
Photo: The Canadian Press
BURNABY — The United Steelworkers union is calling Canfor Corp.’s decision to shutter two northern British Columbia sawmills a “kick in the gut” for workers who will lose their jobs, calling for the company to lose its forest tenure rights in the province.
The union’s Prince George chapter said in a statement that about 325 of the 500 workers at the Plateau mill in Vanderhoof and Canfor’s Fort St. John operation belong to United Steelworkers.
The statement said the union membership was “devastated” to hear Canfor’s announcement on Wednesday that the mills would close by the end of this year, removing 670 million board feet of annual production capacity.
The company blamed the closures on the challenge of accessing economically viable timber, as well as ongoing financial losses and weak lumber markets, but said the final blow was the big increase last month in U.S. tariffs that Canfor called “punitive.”
Brian O’Rourke, president of the USW local in Prince George, said in the union’s statement that while the union will fight for “every benefit and right afforded to members by the collective agreement,” the province must stand up for the beleaguered sector and rural communities.
He asks when “tenure and timber rights held by Canfor” will be taken away “if they can’t mill that timber in those communities.”
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