The Globe and Mail ran a story earlier this week with the headline "Wal-Mart abandons ?bully' tactics." I guess somebody forgot to tell Wal-Mart's managers in Quebec.
Wal-Mart ordered to stop harassing workers in Quebec
The Quebec Labour Relations Board has ordered Wal-Mart Canada to stop intimidating workers who want to form a union.The board's ruling cited efforts to "harass and intimidate" three employees at a Sainte-Foy store outside Quebec City.
The ruling says a Wal-Mart manager demanded one cashier give him the names of union sympathizers.
Louis Bolduc of the United Food and Commercial Workers Union, which is trying to organize workers at the store, said Wal-Mart was using unfair tactics.
"[Getting] the employees in an office with two top managers of the store, asking the employees about the organizing of the union," Bolduc said.
"'How many cards? Are you involved?' You shouldn't do that. If you do that, something is going to happen to you.'"
This is the second time Wal-Mart has been reprimanded for trying to intimidate workers in Quebec, Bolduc said.
Wal-Mart has been ordered to stop intimidating employees and to display the ruling in the store's lunchroom for 30 days.
Update:
Timothy Noah at Slate fisks a speech given by the CEO of Wal-Mart. Great fun is had by all.
Whooee! I been askin' a question here an' there in the Canajun boogeysphere where sum fellers got their knickers in a twist over the WalMarket. All these here free-traders are takin' the side o' ol' Sam Walton against the good an' decent Canajuns in Q-beck on accounta he's a rich Merkin an' they's jest store clerks an' stock boys an' they's uppity 'bout settin' up a union which is sumpin' free traders can't abide.
What I'm wondrin' is how come the free traders is takin' the side of an outfit that's in bed with the commonist red Chinese who gotta be the worst o' the worst when it comes t' torturin' an' stompin' on Christians an' usin' slave labour fer makin' cheap stuff t' sell inta these here WalMarkets?
Nobuddy seems t' have an answer 'ceptin' one feller who sed it was a simple case of hypocrisy an' doubletalk. Yer a smarty feller, Poogie. Got any idees?
Yores trooly,
JimBobby
I don't think hypocrisy explains all of it, JimBobby. Some people really do believe that if you let the market work according to its own logic, everything will work out in the end. I don't agree, of course. When the market operates on its own logic, there are no ethical or moral considerations involved. The Invisible Hand is amoral.
But I do think there's a double standard at work. People point to evidence of corruption in unions and say that it justifies writing off the whole organized labour movement. But when I point to examples of corporate corruption, and I have dozens on file by now, the same people never say that it justifies doing away with corporations.
cbuffsbluff@aol.com