Amazon Canada says it will close all seven of its Quebec warehouses and lay off staff over the next two months.
The e-commerce giant positioned the move scuttling 1,700 permanent jobs and 250 temporary ones as a way to provide “even more savings to our customers over the long run” and dismissed concerns that it was linked to a recent unionization push in the province.
“This is about offering the best service we can to customers in a way that’s efficient and cost effective,” Amazon spokesperson Barbara Agrait said in email on Wednesday, when asked to comment on whether the closures were an attempt at union busting.
The closure of the Quebec facilities will mean Amazon will revert to a business model it used in the province up until 2020, which employed local, third-party companies for package deliveries.
About 240 Amazon workers at the company’s DXT4 warehouse in Laval, Que., a Montreal suburb, managed to unionize in May, becoming the first of the tech company’s Canadian warehouses to unionize.
The process was hard fought, with Amazon challenging the workers’ accreditation with the Confederation of National Trade Unions, which accused the company of “flooding the workplace with scaremongering messages.”
Amazon has previously responded to accusations it’s anti-union by saying it doesn’t think unions are the best option for its employees but that they have the right to join one.
The company lost its challenge at the province’s labour tribunal in October.
Caroline Senneville, president of the union involved with the organizing in Laval, said she has “no doubt” that Wednesday’s closures, which she called “a slap in the face for all Quebec workers,” are part of an anti-union campaign.
“It’s a move that runs counter to the provisions of the Labour Code, and one we’ll be taking a firm stand against,” she said in a press release.
The company has also faced anti-union allegations at a warehouse in the Montreal borough of Lachine, when the province’s labour tribunal ordered Amazon last year to cease interfering in union affairs and pay the union $30,000. The tribunal ruled Amazon communicated anti-union messages to workers, though it rejected a claim that the company had threatened and intimidated employees.
Agrait previously said Amazon strongly disagrees with “the limited finding that our factual communications with employees about the process were somehow improper,” and said the company is challenging that part of the decision.
The closure news on Wednesday followed “a recent review of our Quebec operations,” Agrait said.
“This decision wasn’t made lightly,” she added.
The closing sites span Lachine, Longueuil, Coteau-du-Lac and Laval, and include one fulfilment centre, two sorting centres, three delivery stations and a facility Amazon dubs AMXL because it aids in the shipment of large goods like TVs or furniture.
Laid off staff will receive a package with up to 14 weeks’ pay after the facilities close and transitional benefits such as job placement resources.
Quebec Premier François Legault said he was saddened by Amazon’s move.
“I can understand that it must be tough for the 1,700 families involved with these decisions,” he told reporters Wednesday in St-Sauveur, Que.
But he would not speculate on what motivated the decision, and he stopped short of criticizing it. “Why do they do that, how do they do that, the questions must be asked to Amazon,” he said. “I’m not managing Amazon. It’s a private decision by a private company.”
The closure of the Quebec facilities after the Laval unionization puts attention on an Amazon warehouse in Delta, B.C.
Unifor applied to certify the warehouse for unionization last year, but the results of that vote are sealed due to an unfair labour practices complaint the union filed, which alleges Amazon ramped up hiring to try to dilute union support.
Amazon has denied the allegations and Agrait has said the decision to call a vote at the Delta warehouse “undermines the rights of the majority of our employees in Vancouver who chose not to sign (union) cards.”
Michael Lynk, a professor emeritus of law at Western University, said any Amazon location where unionization efforts have been underway should have a “genuine worry” that they might be shut down as well.
Amazon’s latest Canadian investment report says the company has 34 delivery stations, 23 fulfilment centres, six sorting centres and six AMXL facilities, along with three corporate offices and two tech hubs, in the country.
Lynk suspects Amazon has pushed back against unionization because it typically raises staffing costs by 15 to 25 per cent and holds business to higher labour and safety standards.
While Amazon’s move didn’t surprise Lynk, he saw it as “a labour relations ‘Groundhog Day’” for Quebec, where a similar situation played out 20 years ago with Walmart Canada.
That company closed a Jonquiere, Que., store citing profitability troubles just months after workers achieved union certification.
The United Food and Commercial Workers Union decided to fight back and, in 2014, the Supreme Court of Canada agreed the company defied Quebec labour law when it shut down after unionization.
Because laws have changed little since, Lynk suspects the Confederation of National Trade Unions will pursue an unfair labour practices claim on behalf of Amazon’s Laval workers.
“The union would probably stand a good chance of winning,” he said.
“Unfortunately, it won’t mean that these Amazon workers will get their jobs back.”
— With files from Rosa Saba
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Jan. 22, 2025.
