The Port of Churchill was effectively shut down on Monday when workers were given two-week layoff notices just before the start of the season.
OmniTRAX, which owns the port, is the largest employer in town with roughly 10 per cent of the workforce employed at the port during its seasonal operation.
The Union of Canadian Transporation Employees (UCTE), which represents workers at the port, said in a press release that workers were blind-sided.
“There was no discussion, no warning, nothing,” said UCTE regional vice-president Teresa Eschuk.
Flin Flon MLA Tom Lindsey said OmniTRAX’s decision to lay off its workforce is devastating for those at the port and the community of Churchill.
He criticized Manitoba agriculture minister Ralph Eichler’s response to the layoffs and called on government to find a solution.
“Today, the Manitoba agriculture minister gave platitudes to workers hurt by this decision, telling them ‘You’re gonna have to start looking for other opportunities,’” Lindsey said in a press release. “Rather than calling for action, he offered empty, callous words: ‘I hope they stay,’ and ‘hoping somebody will pick that up.’
“We believe, as do many Manitobans, that northerners deserve more: the provincial government should ‘pick up’ a leadership role and bring stakeholders around the table to find a solution,” he said.
Food cost relief
Some Northern communities in Manitoba and Saskatchewan are among those that will be receiving partial subsidies from the federal government’s expanded Nutrition North Canada (NNC) program.
Last week the government announced it was adding or expanding subsidies to 37 communities, effective Oct. 1.
Communities added to the program or fully updated include Tadoule Lake, Brochet, York Landing, Granville Lake and Shamattawa in Manitoba, and Uranium City, Wollaston Lake and Fond-du-Lac in Saskatchewan.
NNC is designed to help reduce the cost of perishable nutritious food in isolated northern communities.
The 2016 federal budget committed an additional $64.5 million to NNC over five years, beginning in 2016-17, and $13.8 million per year ongoing starting in 2021.
Nutrition North Canada has served 103 communities in Nunavut, the Northwest Territories, Yukon, northern Labrador, Quebec, Ontario, Manitoba and Saskatchewan since June 2014.
