Air Canada must reinstate pilots; First contract for migrant farm workers
Air Canada must reinstate pilots
Ottawa — Air Canada must reinstate two pilots, aged 65 and 67, who were forced to retire at age 60, the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal has ordered. The remedy follows the tribunal’s August 2009 ruling that declared Air Canada’s mandatory retirement provision to be discriminatory. However, the tribunal did not order Air Canada to eliminate mandatory retirement for all pilots, and it stated the finding is not a legal precedent and only applies to this specific case. George Vilven and Neil Kelly, who were forced to retire in 2003 and 2005, must be reinstated with full seniority and be compensated for lost wages from Sept. 1, 2009, plus interest and minus the pension money they received. The tribunal rejected the pilots’ request for $20,000 each for pain and suffering.
First contract for migrant farm workers
Abbotsford, B.C. — Migrant farm workers at Abbotsford’s Sidhu & Sons Nursery are the first to negotiate a collective agreement solely for migrant agricultural workers, according to the United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) Canada union. Under the new agreement, UFCW Canada Local 1518 will represent the migrant workers, primarily from Mexico and Jamaica, who come to Canada under Canada’s Seasonal Agricultural Workers Program to work at Sidhu. The collective agreement provides migrant workers with a grievance procedure, seniority rights, recall rights, paid breaks, increased vacation pay and a wage increase.
