MEDIA RELEASE: Enough is Enough: FFAW Demands Consequences for Royal Greenland
August 9, 2024
MEDIA RELEASE:
Enough is Enough: FFAW Demands Consequences for Royal Greenland
August 9, 2024, ST. JOHN’S, NL – The Union that represents over 14,000 people in the province is calling out Royal Greenland for operating in poor faith to the detriment of the inshore fishery and coastal communities. Royal Greenland has continually refused to follow provincial regulations and ignores the collective bargaining process, and FFAW-Unifor is now demanding provincial sanctions on the foreign-owned company.
“Since first being allowed to operate in this province, Royal Greenland has shown time and time again that they are not interested in ethical business practices,” says FFAW-Unifor Secretary-Treasurer Jason Spingle. “A company cannot be allowed to blatantly and repeatedly disregard labour standards and be permitted to keep their processing license. There must be consequences,” Spingle says.
In the 2024 season, Royal Greenland, a crown corporation of the government of Denmark, has refused to purchase northern cod from harvesters, fraudulently falsified dates on lobster receipts to pay harvesters less than the negotiated minimum price for the week of sale, and tried to coerce sea cucumber harvesters into signing an agreement that would circumvent the agreed upon water loss in the agreed upon 2024 sea cucumber schedule. The company is also on the hook for egregious behaviour by current management in the St. Anthony plant over the last several years, for which the company refuses to take responsibility to ensure processing employees have a safe and healthy workplace.
FFAW-Unifor will be requesting an urgent meeting with both Ministers Gerry Byrne and Minister Lisa Dempster to discuss the lengthy list of wrongdoings committed by Royal Greenland, and to ensure that consequences will be delivered.
“A fish processing license is a privilege, not a right, and there must be repercussions for those who refuse to utilize their license to the benefit of the people of Newfoundland and Labrador. We have two new Ministers in these portfolios, and we hope that action will be taken to ensure that our coastal communities, and the tens of thousands of Newfoundlanders and Labradorians who rely on a prosperous fishery, will be treated with dignity and respect,” Spingle says.
“The only people who are benefiting from Royal Greenland’s operations in Newfoundland and Labrador are their shareholders and the Government of Denmark. Newfoundland and Labrador harvesters and communities continue to be victims to their predatory practices. These behaviours cannot continue, and Royal Greenland must be held accountable,” Spingle concludes.
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