CWA Canada files complaints against Microsoft-BGS

CWA Canada has filed unfair labour practice complaints against Bethesda Game Studios (BGS) which is owned by Microsoft.

The complaints were filed today in Montreal where the union recently certified a unit of 125 workers as part of a cross-border organizing campaign conducted with the Communications Workers of America (CWA).

“We are very proud to have been chosen by Canada-based BGS game and media workers to represent them as their union,” CWA Canada President Carmel Smyth said. “We treat our duty to fairly represent our members as a great honour and responsibility.”

Bethesda Game Studios is known for producing groundbreaking video games like the Fallout and Elder Scrolls series, which allow players to change how gameplay unfolds with their own in game choices. 

Unfortunately, as CWA Canada alleges in its formal complaints, Microsoft-BGS has made the choice to approach bargaining in bad faith, putting arbitrary limits on who can represent the union at the bargaining table, and making the process unnecessarily difficult.

Microsoft-BGS is also refusing to release information about employee bonus pay and details on the company’s Pay Equity Plan, amongst other things. The union has a legal right to this information for bargaining.

The union calls the company’s lack of collaboration “insulting.”

What is particularly concerning is how different the company is treating workers in Canada compared to what is happening in the U.S. There, the same company is bargaining with the union in a collaborative, productive fashion. They have not put limits on CWA bargaining and have been forthcoming with information for U.S.-based employees. The two sides have met a number of times and have already reached tentative agreements, while the same U.S.-based management personnel are treating their Canada-based employees differently.

“For us this is a fundamental issue of freedom of association,” Smyth said. “It’s not fair or democratic to have the employer dictate how we as a union represent our members.”

Smyth said the company is choosing to treat Canada-based employees like second-class citizens, “and we’re telling Microsoft that just doesn’t play in Canada.”

CWA Canada is the country’s only all-media union, representing 6,000 workers at the CBC, The Canadian Press, and newspapers, tech, digital media, and other companies coast to coast.