Amazon is facing a union drive in Quebec as the Confédération des syndicats nationaux has filed a government application to unionize 200 employees at the online retailer's warehouse in Laval in a move that could affect its future property plans in the province.
CSN, the century-old Montreal-based labour union with 330,000 members, said in a statement that it will ask Seattle-based Amazon for a list of employees at the facility it opened at 5555 Ernest Cormier in 2020 in order to determine whether over 50% of the workers have signed onto a bid to join the union. If a majority has opted to join, Amazon will be forced to negotiate collectively with union representatives.
The employees, “...have succeeded in convincing their colleagues that it is by banding together that we can defeat the biggest,” CSN president Caroline Senneville said in a statement.
The union drive could serve to deter Amazon from expanding further into the province of Quebec, Canada's second largest, where it opened a series of properties in 2020 and 2021. Since then, Amazon has opened no others, leaving the company well short of the concentration of industrial facilities seen in neighboring Ontario.
If the drive succeeds, the Laval employees will become the second set of unionized Amazon workers in North America, joining others in Staten Island, New York, who narrowly voted to join the Amazon Labor Union in April 2022.
“Our employees have the choice of whether or not to join a union. They always have," Amazon said in an email to CoStar News. "We favour opportunities for each person to be respected and valued as an individual, and to have their unique voice heard by working with our employees."
Amazon representative Barbara Agrait also said the company "already offers what many unions are requesting: safe and inclusive workplaces, competitive pay, health benefits on day one, and opportunities for career growth. We look forward to working with our employees to continue making Amazon a great place to work."
Friction in Quebec
The union drive is not the only event suggesting that Amazon and its operations in Quebec are not destined to be as harmonious as in other areas of North America.
The Quebec government took aim at the retail giant in April 2020 by creating an online purchase retail platform known as Le Panier Blue that sought to offer a Quebec-based alternative to the Amazon platform. The government spent millions on the project before pulling the plug on the initiative in February 2024.
Meanwhile data from Amazon's site indicates that it has invested far more heavily in Ontario than in Quebec, at a rate far beyond the numerical proportions of the respective populations.
Ontario’s population stands at about 1.8 times the population of Quebec, but the company has 16 times as many employees in Ontario and 10 times the fulfillment centres, according to data on the Amazon Canada website.
Asked about the disparity, Amazon spokesperson Agrait said, “Amazon is continually evolving to better serve our customers. In fact, since 2010, we’ve made direct investments in our Canadian operations of more than $40 billion CAD.”
La Presse newspaper reported in October 2021 that Amazon’s local real estate partner Broccolini had purchased land near Highway 40 and Bourget in the city’s east end in order to build another facility. That project did not advance, and no further Amazon facilities have appeared in Quebec since that time.
Amazon's other Quebec facilities are:
- 80 Leon Malouin, Coteau du Lac, opened October 2021;
- 1100-1200 Norman, Lachine, opened in 2021;
- 5799 Airport Rd Longueuil, opened in October2020;
- 5555 Ernest Cormier Laval, opened in December 2020;
- 3399 Francis Hughes Laval, opened in July 2021; and
- 3000 Louis A Amos Lachine, opened in July 2020.