Some 3,800 workers, members of the Union of Store and Office Workers at SAQ (SEMB), have been on strike since November 19, after more than two years of unsuccessful negotiations for a contract. At a December 8 meeting workers rejected another company offer by 88 percent. And on January 7 several hundred strikers held a lunch-hour demonstration, forming a human chain around the SAQ headquarters here.

More than 68 percent of union members work part-time. The SAQ is proposing that workers be assigned to only one store, instead of a division that includes five or six stores. Workers say this would further reduce the hours for part-time workers. Another important issue in the strike is the growing practice of the SAQ establishing contracts to supply liquor to private agencies. The union says that this is a form of contracting out their work.

Workers remain on the picket line despite many difficulties, including sub-zero temperatures. Dozens of union members also face fines for alleged violations of injunctions that limit the number of pickets at a store to 10. Management has kept 50 of the 400 SAQ stores open during the strike using supervisory personnel. The big business media have waged a campaign aimed at convincing workers their fight to win a decent contract is futile.

The January 14 La Presse reported that more than 100 strikers must appear before a judge for allegedly violating the picketing injunction. If the workers are found guilty, they could face fines of up to $5,000 and a maximum sentence of one year in prison.

The SAQ claims to have sold 92 percent of its projections for the busy Christmas-New Year holiday season. The media has used this claim to deride the union’s ongoing fight for a contract. “A failed strike” was the title of a December 23 editorial in La Presse. A January 20 column in the daily’s business section accused union leaders of being amateurs in all aspects of conducting a strike.

On January 16 a meeting of SEMB members approved by 76 percent the union executive’s recommendation to join the Confederation of National Trade Unions (CSN)—one of Quebec’s labor federations. “I think the CSN intends to help build more support for our strike, we’ll see,” striker Josianne Latreille told the Militant in front of the SAQ store on Mont Royal near Papineau.

On December 21 the Ontario Liquor Board Employees Union, which represents 4,600 workers at the Liquor Control Board of Ontario (LCBO), sent the SEMB a check along with a letter expressing its solidarity. The letter said that in the negotiations with the LCBO that begin in mid January 2005, the Ontario unionists will be fighting for many of the same things as the SAQ workers in Quebec. The National Union of Public and General Workers also issued a statement in support of the SAQ strikers.

Negotiations between SAQ management and the union resumed January 24.  
 
 
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