Toronto city workers’ union rocked by president’s resignation after OMERS payments probe
The head of the union representing 20,000 city of Toronto workers has resigned amid allegations he received payments from his second-in-command after helping him get a prime position on an outside board.
The turmoil in Canadian Union of Public Employees Local 79 comes after OMERS, the municipal employees pension fund, probed concerns that one union official had paid another for the local’s spot on its board, which pays $46,000 a year, the Star has learned.
The revelations are the latest in a string of problems for Local 79 — which has been grappling with infighting and other issues, including grievances over members being fired by the city for not being vaccinated against COVID-19 — and for Canada’s labour movement more broadly, as an unrelated scandal rocks the country’s largest private-sector union, Unifor.
