When the result was announced workers present in the Brooks voting center chanted, “We won, the union’s in!”

About 1,600 of the 2,100 workers participated in the November 4 vote. These included workers who crossed the picket lines during the strike. “The company bused many of the scabs to the vote,” Aamir Shahzad, a meat packer and union representative of UFCW Local 1118 at the Cargill slaughterhouse in High River, told the Militant by phone from Brooks. “They were told to vote no to keep the union out.” Shahzad was assigned by the union to help Local 401 during the walkout.

Under the contract, the first since the union was decertified in the 1980s, all workers will pay union dues. Those hired after November 5 will be union members as a condition of employment. Those who were not members at the time of ratification are not required to join. The 51-month contract includes an immediate wage increase of Can$1 (US$.84), bringing the starting hourly pay to $13, and raises of 30 cents each the next three years, and a 40-cent increase in 2009.

“Come Monday [November 7] we’ll reach out to those who crossed the picket line because we’re all on the same side,” UFCW Local 401 president Doug O’Halloran told the Calgary Sun. “We must make it clear that what we did was not for us, but for all employees,” said meat trimmer and striker Peter Jany, who is a member of the bargaining committee.  
 
 
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