Nathan VanderKlippe
Northern News Services

Yellowknife (Sep 18/02) - Wages for 19 employees at Extra Foods will jump $2 an hour under the terms of a new collective agreement ratified by members of the United Steelworkers of America this week.

The new agreement -- completed two years after the old one expired -- shuffles a number of job classifications for the 81 employees at the two Yellowknife grocery stores, giving a number of staff fairly significant raises.

Those who will not fit under a new classification will receive an extra 20 cents an hour effective immediately and 10 cent an hour raises in the years 2003-05. The new agreement also calls for payment of an additional 25 cents an hour for all hours worked between Sept. 2000 and Sept. 7, 2002, to a minimum of $50. Under that clause, workers will receive a total of about $25,000 in back pay.

The new contract gives workers five sick days a year as well as recognition of Aboriginal Day as a holiday.

"It's a fair agreement for the employees of Yellowknife," said Steelworker union representative Steve Dewell. "At least now they got the contract out of the way for the next three years and there will be some stability."

Extra Foods workers first unionized in 1996. Staff turnover at both the grocery stores and the union office prolonged the signing of the second contract, which ran out in 2000.