3037-98-JD Carpenters and Allied Workers Local 27, United Brotherhood of Carpenters and Joiners of America, Applicant v. Labourers’ International Union of North America, Local 506 and Board of Governors of Exhibition Place, Responding Parties.
BEFORE: Inge M. Stamp, Vice-Chair, and Board Members G. Pickell and A. Haward.
APPEARANCES: Harold F. Caley and Frank O’Reilly for the applicant; S.B.D. Wahl, George Dixon and Gary Griggs for Labourers’ International Union of North America, Local 506; Carl Peterson, Leo Lauro and Mike Moffat for Board of Governors of Exhibition Place.
DECISION OF THE BOARD; September 19, 2000
This is an application concerning a work assignment filed with the Board pursuant to section 99 of the Labour Relations Act, 1995 (the “Act”). A consultation with the parties was held by the Board on May 18, 1999.
The Carpenters and Allied Workers Local 27, United Brotherhood of Carpenters and Joiners of America (“Carpenters” or “Carpenters Local 27”) and Labourers’ International Union of North America, Local 506 (“Labourers” or Labourers’ Local 506”) filed extensive materials supporting their claim to the work in dispute. The employer, The Board of Governors of Exhibition Place (“BGE”), with some exceptions, agreed with the submissions in the brief filed by the Carpenters.
The work in dispute was performed under industrial collective agreements between the Carpenters Local 27 and BGE and Labourers Local 506 and BGE.
The work in dispute is described as the “removal and dismantling of seats from the North Grandstand of Exhibition Stadium”. This work was done prior to the demolition of the Stadium. The seats were composed of a steel frame and a molded plastic seat. The work was performed using an impact gun to remove bolts holding the steel frame into the concrete of the Stadium structure. The seats were completely or partially disassembled. Some seats were completely separated into steel and plastic components; some were kept in one or two seat configurations and some groups of three or four seat configurations were created. The impact gun was used to unfasten the bolts holding the seat components together. Member of Carpenters Local 27 performed the work in dispute. This work involved approximately 600 manhours.
The disassembled seats were removed from the Grandstand and piled on the ground in the Stadium. Some were for sale to the public, some for storage and others for possible installation in the Coliseum to replace existing seating.
Members of Labourers’ Local 506 moved the dismantled seats and seating components from the Grandstand to the ground of the Stadium, stacked and bound them, loaded them onto transport and removed the seats to other locations.
After complaints that the carrying of seats and components down from the Grandstand was too difficult the employer assigned a carpenter to build a wooden shute to be used by the labourers to slide the seats down to the ground. The shute was build in 8-foot lengths by a member of Local 27, in the carpenter shop, assisted by a member of Local 506. That work is not in dispute.
After the initial installation of the shute on the first slope of the grandstand it was unbolted, moved and rebolted as needed from level to level, by labourers.
The work of dismantling and removing the seats from the north grandstand was roughly 60% labourers and 40% carpenters. The same work was performed under a sub-contract to Alnor in the south grandstand. Alnor followed the same assignment of work as BGE.
The work in dispute is not construction work. The relevant collective agreements are industrial type agreements. The recognition clause in the Labourers agreement refers to “all employees of the employer working at Exhibition Place”. The recognition clause in the Carpenters’ agreement refers to all “journeymen carpenters and carpenters’ apprentices employed by the employer in the Municipality of Metropolitan Toronto”.
The Labourers’ brief describes the history of the bargaining rights held by the Labourers’ with respect to the Stadium Corporation. From 1977 to 1989 members of the Labourers performed all work in connection with maintaining the seating in the Stadium. The Labourers had an agreement with the Stadium Corporation. When the Stadium Corporation was dissolved, in 1983, and BGE took over the operation of the Stadium, the Labourers maintained a separate collective bargaining relationship with respect to the Stadium with a separate collective agreement with BGE, Stadium Division. This was in addition to a collective agreement between the Labourers’ and BGE for the Operations Division.
During the period of 1977 to 1989 the work in connection with seating and minor carpentry work was different for the Exhibition Place generally than for the Stadium. Generally work done in the rest of Exhibition Place was done by composite crews of labourers and carpenters. In the Stadium that work was assigned exclusively to labourers.
Sometime in 1989 BGE and the Labourers negotiated one collective agreement merging the two collective agreements (Operations Division and Stadium Division) into one. Appendix “A” to the Labourers’ agreement refers to work WITHIN THE STADIUM which sets out the work jurisdiction of the Labourers as it relates to the Stadium.
The Carpenters were not signatory to an agreement with the Stadium Corporation when it was in existence nor does the current Carpenters agreement have an appendix with respect to the Stadium.
Appendix “A” of the Labourers Agreement with BGE provides as follows:
WITHIN THE STADIUM
Work Jurisdiction – All work performed directly the Employer, including but not limited:
maintenance and repair of all seating and furniture, including all rental furniture;
maintenance and repair of all railings, fences, gates, barriers and turnstiles;
maintenance and repair of all mechanical field equipment;
operation of all equipment including forklifts, tractors, scrubber, game-savers, vacuum equipment;
maintenance and repair of the natural field and artificial surfaces including spray painting of all marking, placing and removal of all surface protection and rubber warning track repairs;
all constructing work including light carpentry work and repairs to doors, crash bars, floor and ceiling tile carpeting;
maintenance and repair of all roofs of all structures;
maintenance of all inside and outside areas including installation of signs, flags, glass and mirrors, all cleaning, sweeping, washing and steam cleaning, painting of all parking lots and general painting;
shipping, delivery handling and moving of all materials and equipment in and out of the Stadium;
erection, moving and dismantling of all scaffolding;
recording or work time and accounts;
all related operating not listed above.
This dispute arises in the context of work performed in the Stadium. To be specific it is work that was done in anticipation of the demolition of the Stadium.
The Labourers take the position that it has held exclusive bargaining rights for work done in the Stadium. The work performed in the rest of Exhibition Place is performed with composite crews of labourers and carpenters. This reflects the history of the bargaining rights of the parties.
The Labourers assert any work performed by the Carpenters with respect to seating in the Coliseum, the Queen Elizabeth Theatre and the Molson Indy race are not relevant to the work performed with respect to the seating in the Stadium. There has been a distinction in the work assignments in the Stadium and assignments for the rest of Exhibition Place.
The Labourers request the assignment and performance of all work in connection with the maintenance, handling, transfer, installation, dismantling, removal, repair and reinstallation of seating in Exhibition Stadium to members of the Labourers union, Local 506.
The Carpenters assert the Labourers agreement and in particular Appendix A of that agreement, does not cover the work in dispute. The Labourers agreement does not include the removal of seating nor does it include work ancillary to the removal of seats, namely the construction of wooden (or any other type of) shutes.
The employer submits the Stadium appendix in the Labourers agreement does not cover the work in dispute and the work that was performed by the Labourers on this project is explicitly covered by the Stadium Appendix. The parties have drawn a clear distinction between maintenance and repair and removal of such material. The employer asserts if the work in dispute is not covered by the Stadium appendix it is not the Labourers’ work.
Decision
The Labourers, for historical reasons, had a separate appendix carving out the work relating to the maintenance and repair of all seating and furniture etc. in the Stadium. That same work in the rest of exhibition place was done with carpenters and labourers. The work covered by the Stadium appendix in the Labourers agreement clearly relates to work that would be done if the Stadium was an operating venue. The work involved was the maintenance and repair of the facility in anticipation of its use for various events.
The work in dispute is none of these functions. The Stadium was slated for demolition. After the baseball team departed the Stadium’s use declined. The Labourers’ agreement does not refer to demolition or removal of seats.
In the circumstances it was not unreasonable for the employer to look at the collective agreements in terms of the broader area, i.e. exhibition place. The assignment was made in terms of how this work would be done in the rest of exhibition place with the labourers performing their portion of the work. The work was assigned on the basis of the usual composite crew used in the rest of exhibition place.
In these circumstances, where the seats were dismantled and removed prior to the demolition of the Stadium, the assignment of the work to a composite crew based on what would be the practice in the rest of exhibition place, was a reasonable assignment. The Board is satisfied the assignment was made in good faith and is not persuaded to interfere with the assignment of the work in dispute made by the employer.
“Inge M. Stamp”
for the Board