Daniel MacIsaac
Northern News Services

NNSL (May 14/99) - Power Corporation workers say their rights are being denied as they try to break ties with the Union of Northern Workers, and they're asking the government for help.

Seamus Henry, MLA for Yellowknife South, presented a petition signed by 108 NWT Power Corporation employees to the assembly Monday.

"We the undersigned would like to express our absolute dissatisfaction with the Union of Northern Workers (UNW) in the Western N.W.T.," the petition reads. "We feel the services we pay for has (sic) not been provided by this union -- therefore we would further express our interest to seek/explore alternative representatives within the Canadian Labour Congress."

But Henry explained that the workers are in a predicament because the territory's Public Service Act designates the UNW as the sole union for government workers.

"The Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms guarantees freedom of association as a fundamental freedom of each Canadian citizen," Henry said. "Our Public Service Act expressly denies that right."

Reg Croizier agrees. Though as president of the corporation's UNW Local 0016 he was barred from signing the petition, he said he sympathizes with it.

"The main thrust of this whole thing is that workers should have the right to choose who should represent them at the bargaining table," he said Tuesday, "and that the members want whoever represents them to actually represent them."

Croizier said the UNW's preoccupation with other matters, including pay equity, resulted in delays in negotiating the corporation employees' collective agreement -- which expired Dec. 31.

"We're not getting answers from the union," he said. "They appear to have tunnel vision, and it's always pay equity this, pay equity that -- I believe pay equity is a good to have but not to the exclusion of other matters."

Croizier said he regrets the UNW did not deal with the issue itself but is confident the politicians will side with the workers.

"I can't really see any politicians denying the right to choose a union, because if they do, they're going against the Canadian bill of rights," he said.

UNW hits back

But Charles Dent, the minister responsible for the Power Corporation, told the assembly Tuesday that the 108 petition signatures did not constitute a majority of the corporation's 217 members.

Dent also told Henry that when the territory assumed responsibility for health care in 1988 the courts ruled that the UNW's position as the designated employees' association did not violate the charter.

In a letter to Henry on Wednesday, UNW President Jackie Simpson also referred to the 1990 Supreme Court of Canada ruling and concluded by saying, "It is the position of the Union of Northern Workers that its relationship with its members is an internal union matter."

Nevertheless, Dent did say on Tuesday that the issue would be examined.