Last month, the Mediation Services department of Alberta Jobs, Economy, and Trade published the May 2026 Bargaining Update.
This monthly report provides information about the unionized workforce, primarily in Alberta. In May, Mediation Services received settlement information regarding 14 private sector and 13 public sector bargaining settlements, covering 1,517 and 2,421 workers respectively.
Among those settlements was a contract for about 50 workers employed by Imperial Dade Canada Inc.
Based out of Ontario, Imperial Dade specializes in distributing packaging, chemicals, janitorial supplies, and printing paper.
The workers in this collective agreement work at the company’s Calgary location and are members of Unifor’s Local 539.
They include all workers at the location except office workers and those employed in sales, managerial, and confidential capacities. Primarily, these are warehouse specialists, shippers, receivers, dispatchers, and drivers.
Their most recent collective agreement expired this past January. Workers ratified their new collective agreement in April.
This new collective agreement brings with it a 4% wage increase in each of the first 2 years and a 3% wage increase in 2028.
| 1 February 2026 | 4.00% |
| 1 February 2027 | 4.00% |
| 1 February 2028 | 3.00% |
| 11.00% |
By the time the agreement expires in Janaury 2029, none of the workers will be making under $55 an hour.
Here are some highlights from the new contract.
The following statement was added to the agreement:
It is recognized that meetings between the Company and the Union are essential to the maintenance of good employee-employer relations and the establishment of mutual confidence and trust. The Company and the Union agree to meet on a quarterly basis to discuss business updates and any concerns that need to be addressed.
This clause:
For each above-mentioned holiday, the employees shall receive eight (8) hours’ pay at his regular hourly rate of pay at straight time rate. If the employee is entitled to a higher rate in accordance with the Employment Standards Act, that higher amount will be paid as a one-time adjustment based on the calendar year (January to December) and will be paid on the first pay in February of the following year.
was replaced with this:
For each above-mentioned holiday, the employees shall receive an average daily wage in accordance with the terms of Alberta Employment Standards Code.
The following clause was added to the agreement:
10.04.b No employee will be unlawfully interfered with, restrained, coerced or discriminated against by the company or the union, their officers or agents on the grounds of race, national or ethnic origin, colour, religion, disability, age, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, marital status, family status, genetic characteristics, political affiliation or conviction for an offence for which a pardon has been granted. The company further commits that no employee will be unlawfully interfered with, restrained, coerced or discriminated against by the company, its officers or agents because of membership in, or lawful activity on behalf of the union.
Under the previous contract, workers received 2 15-minute paid breaks in an 8-hour shift. Those who worked beyond 8 hours would be given an additional 15-minute break. The new contract modified the additional break so that workers would get an extra break for every additional 2 hours they worked.
The following clause was added to the contract:
10.15 Women’s advocate
The parties recognize that female employees may sometimes need to discuss with another woman matters such as violence or abuse at home or workplace harassment. They may also need to find out about specialized resources in the community such as counselors or women’s shelters to assist them in dealing with these and other issues.
For this reason, the parties agree to recognize the role of women’s advocate in the workplace and will provide contract information to reach a women’s advocate. The Company will also assign a management support person to assist the advocate in her role.
As has this clause:
11.01.c For any administrative leave, the company agrees to make contact with the employee within 1 business day to communicate next steps. Where the investigation is still pending, the company agrees that if the time off on administrative leave exceeds the number of days that may be imposed by potential discipline, those days will be paid by the company at straight time. For clarity, if the administrative leave is 2 days and the discipline issued is 1 day, the loss of wages would only be 1 day.
Imperial Dade was allowed to extend a probationary period beyond 90 days in the previous collective agreement. The new agreement sets a maximum for such extensions, which is 30 days.
The following two clauses were added to the agreement:
19.g The parties agree that overtime will be called by seniority based on the needs of the business, during the following time periods 5:00 p.m.–5:00 a.m., 5:00 a.m.–noon, and noon–5:00 p.m., in order to meet deadlines established by customer and distribution schedules.
19.h The company agrees to post an overtime flowchart that outlines the time periods in conjunction with the sign-up sheet. If for any reason the company needs to deviate from the timelines above, they will discuss with the union the business reason.
Workers were supposed to get a $1000 signing bonus for ratifying the collective agreement. This is a one-time lump sum payment and will not increase their base salary. The signing bonus was only $500 for the previous collective agreement.
Immediate family has been expanded to include unborn children for the purposes of bereavement leave.
Language was also updated to be more gender inclusive, replacing he and his with they and their, for example.
