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When BHP Billiton's employees association was created close to five years ago, a number of people working at the mine were not happy with the manner in which the employee association was set up, said Jean Francois Des Lauriers, PSAC regional executive vice president.
PSAC has 12,000 members in the Yukon, Northwest Territories and Nunavut with two fully-staffed regional offices, one in Whitehorse and one in Yellowknife.
"The membership list was made available to the employer, which was extremely unusual. You want to keep that list confidential.
"You don't want to give your employer any cause to victimize people who have shown support for a union," said Des Lauriers.
A complaint was filed with the Canadian Industrial Relations Board (CIRB). After hearing the case, CIRB found that although it was very unusual, there was no conclusive evidence that the employee association was employer dominated, said Des Lauriers.
"The employee association later reached a tentative agreement and presented it to the members for a vote. It was defeated (in December 2002.) It took the wind out of the employee association's sails," said Des Lauriers.
In August 2003, an arbitrator, James Posnick, issued an order that new elections be conducted and appointed a trustee to oversee the conduct of an election.
Both parties agreed to one individual, Mike Desautels, to act as trustee.
In November 2003, a full slate of officers for the employee association was elected.
The BHP employee association is still the bargaining agent, but PSAC is providing services on the same basis as it would for any of its members, said Des Lauriers.
"There's no collective agreement in place. Right now everything is complaint-driven," said Posnick.
The BHP employee association will hold its annual general meeting in February 2004. At that time, merging with PSAC will be on the agenda.
