After a rollercoaster year full of uncertainty and surprise announcements, Vale ended 2017 with more than 100 fewer jobs than it started the year with, which brings their total workforce in Thompson down to approximately 1,180 people.
Even though these job loses were announced well in advance, it doesn’t change the fact that the United Steelworkers (USW) Local 6166, the union these affected employees were members of, is definitely going to feel the squeeze in 2018.
Vale Manitoba Operations plans on permanently closing down their smelter and refinery in the third quarter of the year, which will reduce their total workforce to around 837 people.
Coupled with low nickel prices, the suspension of operations at the Birchtree Mine, and a 20 per cent drop in Vale’s grant-in-lieu to the city and the school district, USW Local 6166 president Les Ellsworth told the Thompson Citizen that they are going to be facing unprecedented challenges over the next 12 months.
“It’s probably one of the most difficult times in our history,” said Ellsworth. “Myself personally, I’ve been around 33 years with Vale and the former Inco, so I’ve seen reductions, I’ve seen layoffs over the years, but nothing to this degree.”
Despite the severity of the situation, Ellsworth wants to ensure the public that his organization will do everything they can to soften the blow and make sure mining remains a viable source of employment in northern Manitoba.
Part of this involves helping Vale accomplish their new objective of reducing operating costs by 20 per cent, which can be partly achieved through increasing work productivity.
“The more ore that you are able to put out the back end of any mining process and put to market, that reduces your cost,” said Ellsworth. “It’s when you don’t meet production than it increases your cost that much more because you’re not getting enough return on that investment.”
The president added that their members have been meeting, and in some cases exceeding, production rates every month since this “20 per cent challenge” was instituted back in 2017.
In the meantime, Ellsworth said the USW Local 6166 will continue to lobby the Manitoba government for support in these trying times, which has helped them get out of rough spots before.
“There was a time when Birchtree was on care and maintenance years ago as well, back in the ‘90s,” said Ellsworth. “And in 2000 the Steelworkers and the former Inco had gone to the government of the day, the provincial government, and we were able to secure what we call ‘new mine status’ for Birchtree Mine, which brought it back online.”
On top of everything else, the local steelworkers union will undergo a significant shift in leadership in 2018, since both Ellsworth and his vice-president Gord Medwid will be retiring as of May 16.
Even though he is only four months away from retirement, Ellsworth said he will continue to fight for his members’ rights throughout the winter and spring, which involves maintaining the collective agreement they negotiated back in 2014.
“As long as I’m president, I’m telling you, we will not open up that collective agreement,” he said. “That is a collective agreement that was negotiated in good faith and it will stay that way until … the contract expires Sept. 15 of 2019.”
While Ellsworth admits that there are some rough times ahead, he encourages everyone to refrain from panicking and remember that Thompson is full of resilient people.
“What I do know about Thompson and the union and the company, we’ve weathered some tough storms, and people have to realize that there’s still a lot of good paying jobs in excess of 800,” he said. “So I think that if we band together, if we get creative, Thompson can have a better outlook than what most people see now.”
USW Local 6166 will hold an election in April 2018 to determine their new executive.
