Baffinland starts process to lay off up to 1,328 employees in Nunavut (CBC News North – June 6, 2022)

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/north/

Letter to Nunavut government gives notice of mass terminations starting Aug. 31

Baffinland Iron Mines Corporation intends to lay off up to 1,328 employees – including 209 Inuit – later this year, according to a notice the company served to the Nunavut government. The letter, dated June 3, says the mass terminations are expected between Aug. 31 and Oct. 31.

However, Joseph Tigullaraq, the head of northern affairs at Baffinland, said Monday afternoon that the company is still working to get approval from the Nunavut Impact Review Board (NIRB) to continue shipping six million tonnes of ore from its Mary River mine this year to prevent the layoffs.

The company, he said, is “doing everything we can in our ability to keep everybody on.” “We do have to put in notice of layoff to the Nunavut Labour Standards Compliant Office — that does not mean employees will be laid off immediately,” he said.

Tigullaraq said it’s a standard procedure under the Labour Act that the company was required to file last Friday. The layoff notice stems from the rejection of an extension of Baffinland’s temporary approval to ship six million tonnes of ore from its Mary River mine, from a previous cap of 4.2 million tonnes. The temporary approval to up its production was given in 2018, but it expired at the end of 2021.

For the rest of this article: https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/north/baffinland-mass-layoffs-begin-1.6478879