By Bob Mackin | Prince George Citizen
Workers at a Continental Way truck dealership will be represented by the International Union of Operating Engineers Local 115 (IUOE) after the consolidation with the parent company’s unionized Great Street location.
In an April 4 ruling, the vice-chair of the BC Labour Relations Board (LRB), Gurleen Sahota, decided in favour of First Truck’s application for successorship status but denied its application for a vote that would have determined whether IUOE continued to represent workers at Great Street.
Sahota also ordered the union’s certification be updated to the employer’s new name, First Truck Centre Inc. (Velocity Truck Centres).
In its submission, First Truck said the two dealerships had been operated by two employers, First Truck Centre Inc. at Great Street and First Industries Corporation on Continental Way. In September 2023, an Alberta numbered company associated with Velocity Vehicle Group acquired the two companies and the two dealerships began to rebrand as Velocity Truck Centres after the deal closed in November 2023.
In early 2024, First Truck decided to merge the dealerships and applied to the LRB for a successor employer declaration for Great Street. The union opposed the application, arguing that the transactions did not result in a successorship. Instead, it was an intra-corporate transfer of employees that did not require a representation vote.
Sahota said there was no indication that the dealerships were ever owned and operated by separate corporations.
“Rather, First Truck’s submissions imply that before the amalgamation, First Industries simply ran these two dealerships through First Truck, which was its wholly owned subsidiary at the time,” Sahota wrote.
Sahota agreed it was possible for divisions of the same company to have different staff and different workplace cultures, but emphasized that the dealerships were owned and operated since 2022 by the same corporation.
According to Sahota, “any employee working at the Continental Way dealership will be represented by the union following the consolidation of Continental Way with Great Street. This is as a result of the bargaining rights stemming from the union’s certification to represent a bargaining unit of Great Street employees.”
