GM, Ford and Fiat Chrysler want to pick up in sync with rivals, but the U.S.’ auto workers’ union wants to make sure safety trumps profit…

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About 10,000 IRS employees are expected to be recalled to offices, where face coverings will be mandatory, but have been told to bring their own masks or risk being sent home.

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Article content Alberta and its western neighbour are offering a lesson in contrast with their differing reactions to COVID-19 cases linked to meat-processing facilities. British Columbia health officials ordered the closure Friday of a poultry plant in Coquitlam where two employees tested positive for the novel coronavirus. In Alberta, however, two Calgary-area chicken plants remain operational despite confirmed cases of COVID-19. There is one COVID-19 case at the Lilydale chicken plant in Calgary’s southeast community of Ramsay and another two at the Mountain View Poultry chicken processing plant in Okotoks. Michael Hughes, a spokesman for United Food and Commercial Workers Canada Local 410, which represents workers at the Calgary Lilydale plant, said his union is pleased to see action on potentially unsafe work environments in B.C. but that he’d like to see the Alberta government heed their workers’ calls to halt operations locally. Advertisement Article content continued “If that’s the measures the B.C. government are taking, that’s a big step in the right direction,” Hughes said. “Our perspective is that you can’t let the fox guard the henhouse. The number-one motivator here for a lot of companies is to keep the supply of food going, and of course that’s important to all of us but it cannot be more important than the people who are involved in the process of making the food. The now-closed Coquitlam plant is operated by Superior Poultry Processors Ltd. and shares employees with United Poultry Co. Ltd., a sister facility to the in Vancouver where 35 staff members have tested positive for COVID-19. Advertisement Article content continued Two of Alberta’s largest COVID-19 outbreaks both centre on meat-packing plants. High River’s Cargill meat-packing plant has seen 558 confirmed cases and one death. It paused operations Monday, with Cargill officials citing the “community-wide impacts of the virus.” Additionally, 156 employees at the JBS meat-packing plant in Brooks have tested positive, with one COVID-19 death confirmed. There, the plant has reduced production to a single shift due to “increased absenteeism.” Government officials say they have followed the advice of chief medical officer of health Dr. Deena Hinshaw in implementing protective measures at meat plants. Advertisement Article content continued According to Adrienne South, press secretary to Minister of Agriculture and Forestry Devin Dreeshen, protocols for food-processing facilities in the province were established after a COVID-19 case was detected in the Harmony Beef plant near Balzac. She added that Alberta Health Services officials have visited Cargill while workplace safety officials completed video inspections at the plant, as well as others. A formal Occupational Health and Safety investigation is underway at both the Cargill and JBS plants. “These investigations will look at the circumstances surrounding potential exposure of workers at Cargill related to COVID-19,” South said. “This will also include an investigation of any potential non-compliance that may have affected the health and safety of workers at the facilities.” Hinshaw said Monday factors including large households and carpooling contributed to the virus spread at Cargill. She said AHS moved “as soon as there was a case” in responding to the outbreak. “I would say that plant shutdown is not the single, only factor in this,” Hinshaw said. “One of the things that we need to learn from this outbreak is that we can’t focus solely on a work site. We need to consider the lives and the different parts of people’s day and where they are and where they might be exposed.” jherring@postmedia.com Twitter: @jasonfherring

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NEW BRUNSWICK, NJ – A caravan of about 70 cars streamed past Rutgers President Robert Barchi’s home on the Busch Campus on Saturday afternoon in a processional protest organized by university union…

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Companies in Central America are facing many questions regarding COVID-19, which have implications in terms of local labor law.

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In a statement, the union said it is seeking enhanced safety protections, as well as better working conditions and higher raises.

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More than 5,000 U.S.meat and food-processing workers have been infected with or exposed to the new coronavirus, and 13 have died, the country’s largest…

Sourced through Scoop.it from: www.insurancejournal.com

Magazine staff have laid the groundwork to unionize for more than a year, but as the coronavirus shut down parts of the economy, organizers realized they had to make a decision.

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Las Vegas casino workers pushed back after Mayor Carolyn Goodman called for casinos and hotels to reopen without mentioning safety measures.

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Amazon-owned Whole Foods is now quietly tracking its employees with a heat map tool ranking stores most at risk to unionize.

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