For three weeks the 2,500 unionized workers organized to furnish the material necessary for the functioning of the potlines.

“We are fighting for the future of our youth; we have kept the plant alive,” said Jeannot Boivin, 49, a worker on the potlines with 27 years seniority, when interviewed by a team of Militant correspondents that visited this area in mid-February.

The SNEAA is affiliated with the Canadian Auto Workers (CAW), which is a member of the Fédération des travailleurs du Québec (Quebec Federation of Labor - FTQ).

The Saguenay region has been hard hit economically. In early 2003 the Consomat food chain and the Laterrière Forestry Cooperative both went into bankruptcy, eliminating a total of nearly 1,000 jobs. In December the forestry giant Abitibi-Consolidated announced the closing of its Port Alfred pulp and paper mill in La Baie, a loss of 640 jobs. And in January Alcan announced the closing of the potlines here.

Saguenay, an important industrial and agricultural center, is located along the Saguenay River, two-and-a-half hours north of Quebec City. The morning that Militant correspondents arrived here four demonstrations were taking place. Workers reported that more than 100 workers from several unions demonstrated at the Chicoutimi Courthouse in support of the Alcan workers, whose union representatives were appearing before the Quebec Labor Relations Commission. Afterwards the demonstrators presented their demands to the Quebec Finance Minister, Yves Séguin, who was in town.

In nearby La Baie, 585 workers from Abitibi-Consolidated’s Port Alfred mill, members of the National Union of Port Alfred Pulp and Paper Workers (SNTPPPA), symbolically escorted the trucks removing the last roles of paper produced in the plant before its shutdown in December.

Finally, 40 workers from the former LB sawmill at Lac-Bouchette, about an hour from Saguenay, demonstrated to protest the delays in reopening the mill.  
 
The Alcan occupation
The shutdown of the four potlines was originally projected for a decade from now. The lines, which use Söderberg technology dating from the 1940s, produced 90,000 tons of aluminum annually, or 36 percent of the Arvida plant’s output.

Alcan had offered the 560 workers affected by the shutdown early retirement and transfers to other departments. But in a region already hard hit by plant closings, the union explained, the workers are fighting for opportunities for young people.

The SNEAA is demanding the replacement of the Söderberg potlines, or the construction of new aluminum fabrication facilities.

In a statement widely reported in the press, SNEAA president Claude Patry said, “Arvida’s workers control the entire chain of production—from the arrival of the bauxite at the La Baie port facilities to the potlines, to the Vaudreuil chemical plant, that converts the bauxite into alumina, the railway system and the hydro-electric installations.”

Speaking to Militant reporters, Jeannot Boivin described how the occupation was carried out on the Söderberg potline where he works replenishing the alumina in the pots and installing the pot linings, a job that is done while the pots are in operation. His job takes him inside the pots where the alumina, a bauxite derivative, is transformed into aluminum. Because of the extreme heat and danger of overexposure to carcinogenic fumes, he can only work for 20 minutes at a stretch, followed by 40-minute breaks.

Boivin said he visited the rest areas to talk to other workers. “I told them, ‘It takes real discipline. The work has to be done safely. The results have to be the same as if the company were here.’” He added, “It is the Söderberg workers who were under pressure, but they had the support of all the other departments and the SNEAA.

“The foremen hung around taking notes on safety; they wanted to use this against us. In 27 years, it was the first time that I saw them worry so much about safety!

“They asked us for our production reports, but if they raised anything else, our answer was: ‘No. We’re the ones who decide. We ask for your collaboration for specific requirements and for the raw materials. This is essential for the workers’ safety.’”

Boivin explained that, “with the help of the maintenance workers we were able to quickly eliminate all the high-risk situations. We now have serious questions about the goodwill of Alcan in health and safety. Under the bosses’ control it was the well-being of the pots that came first, but now, under union control, it’s the well-being of the workers and their safety that comes first. There’s not a ladder or catwalk missing, and the columns and floors have been repaired. We did all that without the supervisors—and to think that we might have waited six months or a year for the same results.”

On January 31 some 5,000 workers demonstrated in support of the Alcan workers. They included contingents from different union federations from throughout region, including 400 workers and their families from the Port Alfred mill.  
 
The stakes in the 200 megawatts
In response to the plant occupation, the company won an injunction against the workers from the Labor Relations Commission. This injunction included heavy fines for the workers individually and the union. Negotiations continued between the union and the company, however, without the injunction being enforced. At the beginning of February the provincial government named a special mediator.

On February 8 the union executive came to a pact with the company that included new guarantees and a promise from Alcan to invest $10 million in the Arvida plant.

At the union meeting called to vote on this agreement union members learned that Alcan would sell the 200 megawatts of electricity saved by the shutdown of the potlines to aluminum plants outside of Saguenay. Workers report that the offer was then rejected unanimously and the unionists demanded that the money saved be used to finance a new plant, and that the 200 megawatts be kept for use in the region.

The 200 megawatts at stake are generated by Alcan’s own dams a few kilometers from the Arvida complex. They were built in the 1930s and 1940s with the help of large government subsidies. When the Quebec government in 1962 nationalized the electrical industry, an action widely supported by the population of Quebec, which saw it as taking control of part of the national patrimony, Alcan’s hydroelectric installations in Saguenay were not included.

Following the February 10 membership meeting, the union called for the nationalization of Alcan’s hydroelectric installations in the Saguenay-Lac St. Jean regions.

Faced with the rejection of the agreement and the continued occupation, Alcan called on the courts to enforce the Labor Relations Commission’s injunction against the strikers. On February 13 the Commission declared the action taken by the Arvida workers and their union constituted an illegal strike.

The SNEAA executive then recommended a return to work under the same conditions as before the occupation. Some 2,000 workers approved this proposal at union meetings on February 16 and 17, but again rejected the company’s proposals and mandated their executive to continue the negotiations with Alcan to protect workers affected by the shutdown of the potlines, and to seek company guarantees that the money it saves is reinvested in the region, as well as the 200 megawatts of power.  
 
Struggle against paper mill shutdown
Another important struggle in the area has been the resistance by workers to the closure of the Port Alfred pulp and paper mill by Abitibi-Consolidated.

On December 10, the company had announced the indefinite shutdown of its Port Alfred pulp and paper mill and another in Lufkin, Texas. With its 640 workers the mill was one of the main employers in La Baie. The company blamed the mill’s high production costs, overproduction, and the recent rise in the value of the Canadian dollar against other currencies. In the last four years the mill has been closed a total of 26 weeks.

“Before it was the youth who left, today it’s people like us. My grandfather worked there, my father worked there. I never thought that I would shut down the mill,” said Camille Gilbert, a paper machine operator with 27 years of experience at the mill. Militant correspondents met him after the demonstration organized by the SNTPPPA the morning of February 13. The SNTPPPA is affiliated with the Confederation of National Trade Unions (CSN).

The evening of the December 14 shutdown 1,500 people met at the mill’s main entrance to greet the last shift to leave. Two days later a demonstration called by students of the La Baie high school in collaboration with the union drew 3,000.

Farmers demonstrated their solidarity December 23 as well as to protest the effects of the “mad-cow” crisis on milk and beef producers. Some 400 people participated in the event in front of the mill.

On March 10 more than 3,000 people, including farmers and Alcan workers from the Arvida smelter, demonstrated in La Baie in support of the Port Alfred workers’ ongoing fight for the reopening of the mill.  
 
 
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