President Ivan Limpright announced the major retail foods bargaining committees today, several months in advance of the reopening of the collective agreements with Sobeys and Overwaitea. The committees are composed of elected members of UFCW 1518’s Executive Board, as well as members elected by delegates to the #MembersFirst bargaining conference held in November. President Limpright also appointed select members in an effort to achieve balance in region, seniority, gender, pay scale and classification.
Members on the Sobeys (Safeway) committee include Kamal Sudha, Erin Moore, Stefan Nielsen, Matt Rose, Bob Milan, Danette Lankmayr, Brad Johnston, Peter Dombroskwi and Doug Evans. Members on the Overwaitea (Save On Foods) committee include Laura Cipolato, Susan Bayly, David Gutierrez, Wes Schellenberg, Dave Diamond, James (Jimbo) Grant, Eric Munro, Graham Leblanc, Jaime Emerson, Brianna Rotta, Christine Holowka and Nisaka Vollert.
President Limpright will lead negotiations at each table, supported by legal counsel and various UFCW 1518 staff. Union representatives Shari Jensen and Dave Archibald will assist him at the Sobeys table while director Donna Tremblay and union representative Fred Scott will join the Overwaitea table.
“The composition of the bargaining committees was very carefully considered,” explained President Limpright. “I selected the staff based on their experience as well as expertise, each of them having led many rounds of successful bargaining over the years. They will support the members on the committees, who have the very important task of negotiating changes to the collective agreements.”
President Limpright added: “We received almost 8000 submissions during our bargaining outreach campaign this fall. The bargaining committees have the critical job of assessing and refining those ideas, suggestions and solutions into proposals that they believe will make our members’ lives better.”
Book off letters were sent to the employer last week and the bargaining committees expect to convene in mid-January.