Support for food processing workers grows with solidarity from NUPGE
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Ottawa – June 1, 2020 – Solidarity with UFCW members working at meat-packing plants across Canada continues to grow as the National Union of Public and General Employees (NUPGE) has thrown its support behind our union’s campaign to “Help Protect Food Processing Workers” during COVID-19.
In a letter addressed to Canada’s Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food and Minister of Labour, NUPGE President Larry Brown urged the federal government to guarantee the health and safety of food processing workers by adopting UFCW’s demands to improve workplace protections, increase physical distancing measures, reduce line speeds, and provide full access to personal protective equipment (PPE) at all meat processing facilities in Canada.
“NUPGE supports the measures that food processing workers and their union are calling for,” Brown states in the letter. “We all want to protect our food supply chain. For that to occur, worker safety must come first, and workers must have a say in how to protect their own health. There can be no supply chain without workers to power it,” the NUPGE leader adds.
“On behalf of UFCW Canada, I would like to thank NUPGE and President Brown for standing in solidarity with the thousands of UFCW members who work in the meat processing industry, from coast to coast to coast,” says Paul Meinema, the national president of UFCW Canada. “We are grateful for your support in helping to send the message that we must protect food workers against the threat of COVID-19.”
To read NUPGE’s letter in support of UFCW members working in food processing, click here.
To lend your support to UFCW Canada’s “Help Protect Food Processing Workers!” campaign, click here.
The National Union of Public and General Employees (NUPGE) is one of the largest labour unions in Canada, representing 390,000 members who deliver public services in provinces across the country. To learn more about NUPGE, visit their website.
UFCW Canada is the country’s leading private sector union, representing more than 250,000 union members across Canada working in food processing and retail, transportation, health care, logistics, warehousing, agriculture, hospitality, manufacturing, and the security and professional sectors. To learn more about UFCW’s presence in the food processing industry, as well as other sectors of the economy, see our union’s latest Annual Report.