Waste pickup service scrutinized

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This article was published 07/02/2018 (2872 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Questions are being raised about the quality of Winnipeg’s garbage and recyclables pickup service after an independent report revealed the two firms now doing the work can fill up to half their workforce with minimum-wage, temporary day labourers.

Gord Delbridge, president of the union that represents most civic workers, said he believes many of the service problems tied to the former contractor, Emterra Environmental, was the result of the firm’s heavy reliance on temporary day workers, who the report said were poorly paid and received little or no training or supervision.

Delbridge said he’s concerned the same problems that dogged Emterra — repeated missed pickups, late pickups, damaged carts — will reappear if the two firms (Green for Life (GFL) Environmental Inc. and Miller Waste Systems Inc.) now doing the work hire the same way.

“Part of the problem when you outsource work is we have very little control over what the contractors are doing, and at the end of the day, their bottom line is profit, not providing service,” said Delbridge, president of CUPE Local 500, which represents about 4,600 civic workers.

The union has been told Miller and GFL are already duplicating Emterra’s poor service record, he said.

A report released Wednesday from the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives/Manitoba (CCPA) detailed Emterra’s work record between 2012 and last fall, when its contract with the city expired.

During that period, the province’s Department of Workplace Safety and Health issued 22 stop-work orders and 58 improvement orders. In addition, 138 injury claims were accepted by the Workers Compensation Board.

The CCPA report, entitled Trashed: How Outsourcing Municipal Solid Waste Collection Kicks Workers to the Curb, found 50 per cent of Emterra’s workforce consisted of temporary day labourers earning minimum wage, and as many as 50 per cent of its truck drivers were subcontractors who also relied on temporary work agencies to fill their truck crews.

Ellen Smirl, author of the CCPA report, said the study did not link Emterra’s training methods and its poor performance record, “But you could extrapolate to that.”

Smirl’s report, which included interviewing 20 people who worked as “swampers” on Emterra trucks, found relying on temporary employment agencies for work “tends to create poor paying jobs and risky working environments.”

(A copy of the CCPA/Manitoba report can be downloaded at: wfp.to/outsourcing.)

Miller and GFL Environmental started operations in October, after being awarded a seven-year, three-month contract, with a combined total annual cost to the city of $24.7 million — $6.7 million more than the previous contract. GFL services the east side of the city and Miller works curbside collections on the west side.

A civic spokeswoman confirmed there were no limits in Emterra’s contract on the number of temporary day labourers the firm could hire, but added the new contracts with GFL and Miller stipulate those firms can subcontract up to 50 per cent of their workforce and the subcontractors have to be approved by civic officials.

The spokeswoman said, currently, there are no subcontractors on the GFL and Miller workforces.

The city’s contracts with GFL and Miller prohibit the firms from talking directly to the media. Calls to both companies were not returned Wednesday.

The spokeswoman said the contracts with the two firms include penalties for poor performance. “The city has contract provisions that mitigate substandard performance through liquidated damages and service-level penalties.”

Coun. Ross Eadie, a vocal critic of Emterra, said he’s aware Miller is reportedly missing some pickups, but the problem is “nowhere near what it was like with Emterra.”

Eadie said he doubts Miller and GFL will rely on day labour. “It would make no sense for them to use temporary workers,” he said. “They have a richer contract, which should allow them to pay higher wages. They know if they use day labourers, the work will suffer and they’ll have to pay penalties.”

Delbridge said he recognizes city hall doesn’t want to see a repeat of the poor service record, adding provisions in the new contracts attempt to mitigate sloppy work and missed pickups. However, he said allowing contractors to rely on temporary day labourers is a sign companies, when pressed, will put their profit margins ahead of the city’s best interests.

“They want to maintain that profit and they will do whatever they can in the most cost-effective means and often that comes at the expense of a reduction in the level of service to maintain those profit margins,” he said.

aldo.santin@freepress.mb.ca