United Parcel Services - UPS (Canada) vs. 8 Temporary Agency Workers

FUNDRAISER

Join us for a night of Somali Food, Inspirational Speakers, Film and Music!

Wednesday June 25, 6pm

Innis Town Hall, U of T, 2 Sussex Ave.

 

The Workers' Action Centre is working with 8 Muslim women who wear hijabs and jilbaabs and who were employed for almost two years as temporary agency workers at UPS. In 2005, the temporary jobs were phased out as a result of collective bargaining and the women applied for permanent positions doing exactly the same work.  It was only then that UPS declared that their clothing posed a health and safety hazard. Not once during their period of previous employment did UPS management raise any issue with their clothing. Permanent employment, they were told, was conditional on raising their skirts to make them shorter. The women refused on religious grounds and they found themselves without work.

The women believe there was something inherently wrong with the way they were treated. They believe that they have been discriminated against based on gender and religious grounds. 

The women contacted the Workers' Action Centre who worked with them to retrieve unpaid wages from the temp agency that had given them assignments at UPS.  The women met with upper management at UPS in an attempt to get their jobs back.  UPS again refused unless they raised their skirts to their knees.  There was no attempt on the part of UPS to accommodate the women in different jobs or to research alternative solutions.  The women realized they would not be returning to their jobs at this company and filed a Human Rights Complaint.

This case is also about the human rights violations and exploitation temporary workers routinely experience at the hands of employers who make substantial profits at the expense of workers who often have no choice but to accept precarious employment.  It is important to note that women, racialized communities and new immigrants are over-represented among temporary workers due to systemic discrimination in the labour market.  Temp agency jobs often act as barriers to finding permanent and therefore better paying employment.  The rise of Islamaphobia has exacerbated the barriers these particular women faced at UPS and also in their ongoing attempts to find stable and fairly paid work after this experience. 

The women filed claims at the Canadian Human Rights Commission who has seen the case through to the final stages.  Over 3 years later, the case is now at the Tribunal.  The process of taking a case through this system is costly to workers.  The women must take time off of work for days on end.  They must find childcare for their children.  They need to take transportation to and from numerous meetings.  UPS has hired a Bay Street law firm to fight this case.  They have endless resources.  We have a lawyer who is generously donating her time.  However, these costs continue to rise and we need to find the resources to cover expenses for a case that has important implications for the growing number of precarious workers in similar employment situations. 

This brings us to the fundraiser being organized by a number of organizations in support of the women's case on June 25th, 2008.  The event will help us raise the funds we need to ensure the women are not out of pocket on these expenses on top of the mental stress and anguish the case is costing them.  Not only will we raise the money we need to get the women through this case, but the awareness of the very vulnerable position that all temporary workers face when up against discrimination or workplace violations.   

By supporting this event, you will be supporting the movement of workers – temp workers, contract workers, workers in unstable work - who are challenging the conditions of low wages and unstable employment, the lack of enforcement of our basic rights and who want to expose these problems so that we can make the positive changes we need to make a decent living.