Edmundston mill workers accept contract

Unionized workers at the Fraser Papers Inc. pulp and paper mill in Edmundston have accepted a new contract offer.

Two hundred workers voted Tuesday night to accept the company's final contract offer. The new deal includes a number of concessions on the part of the workers, including changes to pensions and benefits.

Edmundston Mayor Jacques Martin said mill management contacted him Tuesday to get the union back to the bargaining table.

The two sides sat down with a lawyer Tuesday afternoon and came up with a package.

"This means that theyll return to work. Sulphite mill operation will be put together in the coming days," Martin said.

"All the employees on senior staff engineers and so on that were laid off Friday afternoon, there were 20 of them will probably get back to work as early as tomorrow or the end of the week to put things together to make sure we get that sulphite mill in operation."

In February, the company said it would lay off 78 permanent employees at the Edmundston mill, with the first round of cuts beginning in July.

Dave Coles, president of the Communication, Energy and Paperworkers Union, said Tuesday the deal had been turned down several times before, but was accepted Tuesday night after some modifications.

The pension plan will be reworked, and several benefits will be removed, he said.

"Our members have worked diligently and have not taken pay raises for years to try to ensure that mill can survive," Coles said. "And this is a very difficult time for them, and theyre still not out of the woods yet."

The deal still has to be approved by the monitor for the restructuring of the company. In June, the pulp and paper company filed for bankruptcy protection in Canada and the United States.

Coles said thefirm still has some significant hurdles to get through before it can survive the economic crisis.

Fraser Papers, based in Toronto, operates mills in New Brunswick, Quebec and New England.