Vernon and Penticton truck drivers are getting their jobs back after “anti-union” layoffs

A truck driver from Vernon and two from Penticton who were fired for various misconduct have gotten their jobs back. The British Columbia Labor Inspectorate said her employer had anti-union motives in firing her.

Matt Bramall of Vernon and Jamie Stevenson and Joshua Buhnai of Penticton were all terminated from Gordon Food Service Canada — where they had each worked as delivery drivers for at least two decades — within a two-week period from late December 2023 to early January 2024.

However, in a Sept. 25 decision, the BC Labor Relations Board ordered Gordon Food Service to reinstate the three drivers, saying the food distribution company fired them in part because they supported unionization efforts.

Teamsters Local Union No. 31 represents the truck drivers, and the board found that Gordon Food Service knew about the union’s organizing efforts in the Okanagan in the summer of 2023, months before the drivers were laid off.

According to the decision, the three delivery drivers became internal union organizers in August 2021. Her activities at the time included talking to colleagues about union formation, distributing information, and collecting membership cards and sending them to the union.

In spring 2023, the company converted its fleet from manual transmission trucks to automatic transmission trucks, which have a “suite” of safety features, including safety sensors that beep, flash or automatically apply the truck’s brakes depending on the situation.

The decision states that Bramall had problems with the safety sensors, “e.g. B. that the brakes were applied unexpectedly and without warning and that the sensor lights in his mirror illuminated and made it difficult for him to see.”

Bramall testified that he discussed the problems with his supervisor several times and asked for his old truck to be returned. His boss told him, “It is what it is.”

Sometime this summer, Bramall began unplugging the security sensors. The company found out about this in December, after which Bramall admitted to turning off the sensors. Bramall told management that he believed the sensors were “more dangerous than helpful” and said that the “constant bombardment” from the alarm systems had affected his mental health, causing him to act out of anger and frustration switched off the systems, the decision states.

Bramall was fired on January 2, 2024 for turning off the security system.

His firing came about two weeks before the firings of Stevenson and Buhnai at Penticton Yard, both in connection with a boot pay program that Gordon Food Service said they had exploited. Stevenson had testified that he did not understand the company’s boot allowance program and did not believe he had done anything wrong at the time.

Meanwhile, the employer found that Buhnai was “belligerent” when asked to comment on the boot allowance and fired him on that basis. Buhnai testified that he spoke harshly to his superiors because he was in shock at being fired six days before Christmas.

The Teamsters Local No. 31 argued that the company fired all three drivers in part because of anti-union hostility and with the intent to “suppress ongoing union efforts.” It was said that a unionization campaign was underway at the Vernon and Penticton delivery yards at the time the company laid off drivers, all of whom were seeking unionization at their workplaces.

Gordon Food Service argued there was a legitimate reason to fire the Penticton drivers and that Bramall’s disabling of the safety sensors constituted a “serious safety breach.” The company also said it had no knowledge of the union organizing campaign at the Penticton or Vernon shipyards or the participation of the laid-off drivers in the unionization effort.

But ultimately the board sided with the union and the drivers.

The board said it did not accept “the employer’s evidence that it was unaware of the organizing campaign at the Penticton and Vernon shipyards” because the union had already made its Delta warehouse campaign public by then and the Employers of the union’s campaign followed social media accounts, and the company’s transportation manager attended management meetings to discuss the union’s organizing efforts.

The board also concluded that Gordon Food Service “most likely” knew the drivers were union supporters.

It said the decision to fire the three drivers was a “disproportionate” measure given the misconduct committed.

“The employer had no credible, anti-union reason to enforce the disciplinary action,” the board said.

The board ultimately ordered Gordon Food Service to reinstate the fired drivers and compensate them for lost wages.

The board also ordered the company to hold a one-hour meeting between the union and its employees in Penticton and Vernon, at the employer’s expense, during working hours and without management’s presence.