A Metro grocery store in Ottawa’s South Keys neighbourhood will be replaced by a Food Basics this fall, costing dozens of employees their jobs.
Metro Inc. says the store, which closed Wednesday, is being converted to a Food Basics to better meet customer needs in the area.
“We regularly assess our store network based on a range of factors, including local market conditions and store performance,” a spokesperson with the company wrote in a statement to CBC. “Moving to a discount banner reflects the type of market and demand in the area.”
The decision still came as a shock to employees at Metro’s Southgate location, however.
“We were all just stunned,” said Justin Braganza, a meat cutter who has worked at the store for more than 30 years.
Braganza, who’s also a volunteer steward with the United Food and Commercial Workers union, said he and his colleagues were informed of the impending closure in May by their regional manager and another Metro representative who cited financial pressure.
“They said that rent had gone up and that they didn’t feel that our store was profitable enough to sustain the Metro model,” he explained. “We were told very bluntly that we were all being terminated.”
CBC asked Metro if the cost of rent contributed to its decision to convert the Southgate store, but the company maintained the change was made based on local market conditions and customer needs.
The Southgate Metro employed 72 people. Metro told CBC that under to the terms of their collective agreement, those workers don’t have the option to transfer to other Metro stores.
“Employees who are interested in working at the new Food Basics store are invited to apply and will be considered through that process,” the company wrote.
Employees blindsided
The collective agreement for the new Food Basics store requires Metro to hire a minimum of 10 part-time and five full-time employees who worked at the Southgate Metro and who apply to work at the new store, a spokesperson with the company explained.
Because Metro and Food Basics operate under different wage structures, if a former Metro Southgate employee is hired at the new store their seniority will be taken into consideration within the Food Basics pay band, the spokesperson said.
That’s little comfort to employees like Braganza, however.
“It was just an absolute gut punch,” he said. “They don’t use meat cutters at Food Basics, so I don’t have a job waiting for me at this new store if I was even successful in the application process.”
He said some of his colleagues could have even more at stake.
“One or two of our employees are even here on work permits, and them remaining in Canada depends on them having a job, and to not have a job, that really makes their situation so much more tenuous.”
Some Metro customers were also disappointed at the news.
“To me, it’s just disrespect for the workers. That’s what bothers me very deeply,” said Michael Vorobej. “I think Metro just wants to up their profit margin, and they want to do it on the backs of the people that have been working for them for so long.”
Union negotiated ‘enhanced options’ for workers
The union representing workers at the Southgate Metro declined an interview, but in a statement to CBC said its representatives had reached out to Metro to advocate for its members’ rights.
“As a result, UFCW Locals 175 and 633 negotiated enhanced options for our members at the Metro store, including job opportunities at the new Food Basics store and enhanced severance options,” the union wrote.
It also said it held individual meetings with affected members to outline those options, “which was well received and appreciated by the employees.”
A lawyer who specializes in employment and labour law reviewed the collective agreement between Metro Inc. and UFCW Local 175, and told CBC the deal does allow the company to lay employees off due to a shortage of work.
“That leaves the question … if Metro is basically shutting down and then opening up and rebranding itself as a Food Basics, is there actually a shortage of work? Did they actually not have enough work for these positions, or is it more a change of corporate identity?” asked Nelligan Law partner Malini Vijaykumar.
Vijaykumar said a union may file a grievance challenging a company’s claim of a work shortage. It may also argue that a company’s actions constitute anti-union behaviour, opening the door to litigation.
“That can take months and months, and all the while your employees are out of work and out of pay,” she said.
Alternatively, these cases can be resolved through settlements between the union and the employer. Vijaykumar explained that these deals often include confidentiality clauses and bar unions from filing grievances.
“Unions are typically pretty vocal,” Vijaykumar said. “Where you’re not seeing that and where an enhanced severance arrangement and job opportunities and that kind of thing seem to have been worked out, it may be a sign that there has been a sort of agreement worked out between the parties.”
If that has happened, both sides will be cautious about communicating details of any deal, she said.
Meanwhile, Braganza said he and other employees are feeling sidelined and without much recourse.
“It illustrates that workers have very few rights in this situation,” he said. “The employer holds all the cards.”
Braganza said he’s been reflecting on the relationships he’s built with colleagues and customers that he’ll have to leave behind.
“It’s like we were a little family, and now with this closure we’re all going to go our separate ways and it’s going to be hard,” he said.
