Earlier this month, Alberta Mediation Services published their bargaining update for August 2026, which covers all the collective agreement settlement information received by Mediation Services in last month.
This information included 31 bargaining relationships encompassing 3,645 workers. Of those, 16 were private sector and 15 were public sector, with 2,130 and 1,515 workers respectively.
One of the private sector agreements was for workers employed by Gateway Casinos.
These 200 or so workers are members of Local 401 of the United Food and Commercial Workers.
With head offices in British Columbia, Gateway Casinos and Entertainment Limited has facilities in BC, Ontario, and Alberta, including 2 in Edmonton.
The workers in the agreement are all employed by Gateway at their Starlight Casino in Edmonton. They include dealers, supervisors, cashiers, housekeepers, dealertainers, boxmen, bartenders, servers, kitchen prep, dishwashers, cooks, porters, bussers, hosts, and those working on the slot floor and in guest services and the count room.
Their previous collective agreement expired in June 2024. This new agreement was ratified in May 2025 and took effect the same day. Mediation Services received the new contract only recently however.
Gateway has a habit of not making their contracts retroactive to when the previous one expired.
As I outlined, their previous contract expired in June 2024, but the new one took effect in May 2025, not July 2024. Similarly, the contract prior to that expired in June 2020, but their last contract did not take effect until october 2022, over 2 years later.
The workers received a 3% wage increase in every year of the new 3-year contract, which expires in June 2028.
| 16 May 2025 | 3.00% |
| 1 July 2025 | 3.00% |
| 1 July 2026 | 3.00% |
| 1 July 2027 | 3.00% |
| 12.00% |
While a 12% wage increase might seem like a lot, keep in mind that these workers received no wage increases during their last two collective agreements, from June 2019 until, well May 2025.
During that same period, the consumer price index in Alberta increased 31.2 points, from 140.7 in June 2018 to 171.9 in May 2025. That is a jump of 22.17%.
These workers got wage freezes while inflation grew by more than 22%, and they got a measly 3% to make up for it.
Sure, it is true that they will get another 9% over the rest of their new collective agreement, but inflation will increase during those 3 years as well, so the new inflation could eat up those increases.
For example, inflation has already increased by 4.6% since the start of the new collective agreement, and we are barely a year into the agreement.
By the end of the agreement, all positions except cooks, boxmen, security officer, head cashiers, and supervisors will still have starting wages under $20 an hour.
Boxmen and supervisors will be the only ones with starting wages above $22 an hour. For reference, the 2025 living wage for Edmonton was $22.30.
Here are some of the most significant changes in the new collective agreement.
The trial period for dealers has decreased from 720 hours to 580 hours. As well, their job evaluation will occur at 290 hours instead of 360 hours.
Under the previous collective agreement, the period for selecting an arbitrator for unresolved grievances was 30 days. That has increased to 90 days in the new agreement.
Workers had to replace items of their uniform that ended up lost. Now, that is only the case if items are lost “excessively”.
Name tags can now contain a workers so-called preferred name, rather than just a birth name, as long as it matches what is in Gateway’s HR system.
Workers now have the option to defer bereavement leave (within reason) rather than immediately after the death of the family member.
The article on discrimination has added the following identity markers as things workers should not face discrimination for: income source, family status, religious beliefs, gender, gender identity, gender expression, physical disability, and mental disability.
When a part-time worker is scheduled for more than 35 hours per week for 12 consecutive weeks, Gateway will meet with the union to discuss converting their position to full time.
Workers who sit on the company’s health and safety committee are paid straight time for meeting attendance plus a $30 stipend. The new collective agreement states that meeting renumeration now has a minimum of $75.
Extended health care, dental, and vision no longer has an age limit. In the previous agreement, these benefits expired after workers turned 70 years old.
Short-term disability expires when a worker turns 70 years old. It expired at 65 years in the previous agreement.
The health spending account for part-time workers has increased from $400 a year to $650 a year.
