Last month, the Mediation Services department of Alberta Jobs, Economy, Trade, and Immigration published their February 2026 Bargaining Update.
This monthly report provides information about the unionized workforce, primarily in Alberta.
In February 2026, Mediation Services received settlement information regarding 43 bargaining relationships encompassing 37,540 employees. There were 19 private sector and 24 public sector settlements, covering 5,895 and 31,645 employees respectively.
One of those collective agreement was between 16 hydrovac workers and Lonestar Vacuum Inc.
Also known as Lonestar Sylvain Inc. and Lonestar West Inc., Lonestar Vacuum is based out of Calgary. Their workers provide hydrovac, vacuum, and water truck servicesas well as shoring equipment—throughout Western Canada and Ontario.
These workers are represented by Local 955 of the International Union of Operating Engineers. They represent hydrovac operators and hydrovac technicians employed by Lonestar throughout Alberta.
Their previous collective agreement, which was for 3 years, expired at the beginning of last month. The new agreement is effective as of the end of January and is for only 2 years. It was ratified less than a week before the previous one expired.
This is only the second collective agreement these workers have negotiated with Lonestar while members of Local 955.
Under the new contract workers received a 3.0% wage increase last month, and they will get a further 2.5% next February. By the end of the contract, no worker will be making uner $25 an hour.
Workers got a 2.5% wage increase in 2023 and 2024 under the previous agreement, but there did not seem to be a wage increase last year.
Here are some other changes found in the new collective agreement.
The shop rate has increased from $20 an hour to $25 an hour for hydrovac operators and from $18 an hour to $18.50 an hour for hydrovac technicians.
In the event of a layoff, the employer must ask for volunteers to be laid off. This was not in the previous agreement, which started layoffs with permit holders first. Permit holders will now be second after any volunteers.
The previous collective agreement required anyone who wanted to transition from a training position to a non-training position to have worked in their training position for 12 months. The new agreement simply requires that the workers “demonstrate competency” in the desired position.
As well, workers in training will be otherwise automatically advanced to a class II position after 12 months of employment.
Workers who are asked to mentor and assess new workers will be paid $1 an hour under the new agreement. There was no such premium listed in the previous agreement.
There is also a new solo operator premium of $4 an hour to hydrovac operators who have to work without a hydrovac technician.
Vacation time increases from 2 weeks per year to 3 weeks after workers have been with Lonestar for 3 years. The previous agreement required workers to have been with the employer for 5 years.
The following clause was added to the collective agreement:
When an employee is not on duty, and is designated by the employer to be on standby, such employee will be paid 4 hours at straight time rate for being on standby. An employee on standby must be available to attend work as required. No standby pay will be paid for the whole period the employee is on standby when the employee is unable to report to work when required. If work is initiated on the day of standby, the hours worked will be paid, with a minimum of 4 hours.
The per diem was $50 per night in the previous collective agreement. It has increased to $60 this year, and it will increase further to $65 next year.
Doctor’s notes for absences of 3 days or longer will no longer be required upon returning to work. They will now be left to the employer’s discretion.
A letter of understanding has been attached to the new collective agreement that allows for wage increases for a handful of workers whose wages are outside of the wage grid.
The new collective agreement expires in January 2028.
