Unifor National President Jerry Dias attends a news conference announcing a tentative agreement for 9,000 members working at Fiat Chrysler Automobiles, October 15, 2020. Tijana Martin/The Canadian Press
Former Unifor national president Jerry Dias, who was accused by his own organization of improperly accepting $50,000 from a vendor, panicked more and more in his final days before stepping down and exerted pressure on a former assistant. who had made the initial complaint about the alleged payment.
Mr. Dias used his power and influence within Unifor to get his current assistants to convince the whistleblower, Chris MacDonald, to withdraw his complaint so that an investigation into Mr. days One of those attendees was Scott Doherty, a close friend of Mr. Dias is now running in Unifor’s elections for its next president.
These allegations, and other details of the events that led to the abrupt withdrawal of Mr. Unifor days this year, they are in a 29-page third-party research report that was reviewed. by The Globe and Mail. It was prepared by the employment law firm Turnpenny Milne LLP and submitted to Unifor on 15 March.
Some of the contents of the report were already known to the public, but the document in its entirety contains previously unknown details.
It paints a picture of a culture of fear at Unifor, the nation’s largest private sector union. He describes that Mr. Dias holds sway over his aides, prioritizing loyalty over ethics and even promising gifts to the most loyal of them.
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During the nine years of Mr. In his days at the helm of Unifor, he was perhaps the most respected face of Canada’s labor movement, with a reputation for being a tough negotiator. He successfully campaigned for billions of dollars in new automotive contracts for Ontario workers and was a key figure in the renegotiation of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA).
Mr. MacDonald, the former assistant, filed his formal complaint against Mr. Days in January The recipient of that complaint was the union’s secretary-treasurer, Lana Payne, who, like Mr. Doherty, is now running for union president.
Mr. MacDonald told Ms. Payne that Mr. Dias had received $50,000 as a gift from a provider of rapid COVID-19 tests, in exchange for promoting the company’s tests to union members.
And Mr. MacDonald claimed that he had personally received half of the money from Mr. Dias, as a cash reward for getting Unifor-affiliated employers to buy these tests in bulk. (The name of the supplier is not disclosed in the report.)
In March, the Turnpenny Milne investigation found that Mr. Dias had accepted the money and that, in doing so, he had violated Unifor’s code of ethics. Details of the investigation’s findings were leaked to the media at the end of the month, and Mr. Dias was embroiled in an ethical scandal.
He announced his retirement in March, citing health issues, just three days before the union revealed he was under investigation. Mr. Dias is also being investigated by the Toronto Police Service’s financial crimes unit for allegedly receiving the $50,000. No charges have been filed, and it’s not yet clear if there will be.
A union hearing was scheduled on the conduct of Mr. Days for April, but it was postponed due to his health. Earlier this year, he told unions and the public that he had checked into a rehab facility after months of uncontrolled use of painkillers, sleeping pills and alcohol to treat a sciatic nerve problem.
The third-party investigation, commissioned by Unifor and conducted by veteran employment lawyer and workplace investigator Catherine Milne, is based on witness statements and evidence in the form of texts, emails and call logs provided by Mr. Doherty, Mr. MacDonald and Unifor’s. Ontario Regional Director Naureen Rizvi.
The report of Ms. Milne devotes eight pages to detailing how Mr. Dias tried to interfere in the investigation by pressuring Mr. MacDonald to withdraw the complaint, sometimes through text messages and phone calls and sometimes through his other aides, including Mr. Doherty.
The report also details how Mr. days he allegedly came to accept the $50,000, and the circumstances that led him to give half of that money to Mr. MacDonald.
The researchers wrote to Mr. Dias on Jan. 31 to present him with their process and ask him to contact them to schedule an interview, according to the report. They also asked him for the relevant documentation. Mr. Dias did not answer.
The report says that Tom Curry, who is the managing partner of Lenczner Slaght LLP and the attorney for Mr. Dias informed investigators on February 7 that Mr. Dias was on medical leave and could not participate in the investigation. As a result, the report notes, the investigation’s finding that Mr. Dias breached the union’s code of ethics was made without its own evidence.
In a lengthy email response to The Globe’s questions about the report, Mr. Curry called the investigation “flawed,” because Mr. Dias “did not have the ability” to participate.
Mr. Curry said that Mr. Dias had always been guided by the principles of Unifor’s constitution. “Allegations suggesting otherwise are inaccurate and I’m sure a fair and impartial process would prove that.”
Mr. Curry noted that Unifor’s National Executive Board received a psychiatric evaluation of Mr. Days by a well-known specialist, Jonathan Rootenberg, who advised Mr. Days that he did not participate in the investigation due to his “current mental state”. “
Unifor did not challenge Dr. Rootenberg’s assessment and did not produce a report that contradicted the doctor’s findings, Mr. Curry. He added that Unifor’s decision to continue the investigation despite Mr. Dias contradicts the union’s longstanding commitment to protect its members from unfair investigative procedures and prevent them from being ostracized for mental health and addiction issues.
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Investigators began contacting union leaders, including Mr. MacDonald on Jan. 29, according to the report. It was that day, according to Mr. MacDonald, that Mr. Days and Mr. Doherty began pressuring him through calls and text messages.
Mr. Doherty told investigators that Mr. Dias had received a letter on January 29 from Ms. Payne informing her of the investigation and that Mr. Dias was “in panic mode.” I wanted Mr. Doherty intervened with Mr. MacDonald.
“Call me as soon as possible,” read a message that Mr. Doherty sent Mr. Dias via the Signal messaging app on January 29. The next day, Mr. Doherty texted: “Everyone is ghosting me. Jerry is upset but says he can’t talk to me.
The pressure of Mr. Days and Mr. Doherty continued for the next few days. In a Signal message group called “The Big Three,” consisting of Mr. Days, Mr. Doherty and Mr. MacDonald, both Mr. Days like Mr. Doherty posted memes about loyalty, according to the report.
In the early hours of February 1, Mr. MacDonald received an increasingly frantic series of texts and Whatsapp messages from Mr. Dias, asking him to withdraw the complaint. February 1 was also the day of a meeting of the union’s National Executive Board, where Mr. Dias had to announce Mr. Doherty as his successor (he had previously planned to retire in August).
At 4:07 in the morning, Mr. Dias wrote: “Sorry to message you so soon. Please call me when you wake up. It’s about the meeting today. It’s about the union we both love. It’s not about us.” .
“Please,” sent Mr. Days at 5:40 in the morning
And then, at 6:30: “Today is an important day for our union, we have to talk. We’ve known each other for a long time and you’re literally my family, probably the person I’ve been closest to in the union. We cannot let this destroy the union. I have to tell you what I’m doing.”
Mr. Doherty kept up the pressure on behalf of Mr. Days throughout that day, according to Mr. MacDonald to the researchers. In a text, Mr. Doherty wrote that Mr. Dias had not said what was being investigated. But, Mr Doherty added, he knew it was serious and Mr Dias wanted to make it go away.
In response, Mr. MacDonald said he needed the investigation to continue. To which Mr Doherty replied: “If he [Dias] retires today and we’re making sure you’re exonerated from what’s most needed.”
Mr. Doherty had a conversation with Ms. Rizvi about the $50,000 gift. According to the statement of Ms. Rizvi to the researchers, Mr. Doherty told him that he had gone to Mr. MacDonald to ask him if they could reach a deal, but that Mr. MacDonald “felt under a lot of pressure.”
“I don’t know what’s going on, but Dias wants me to fix it,” said Mr. Doherty, according to the statement of Ms. Rizvi.
Ms. Rizvi said she told Mr. Doherty that the harassment of Mr. MacDonald “wouldn’t fix it.”
After being ignored by Mr. MacDonald for days, the report says, Mr. Dias got angry. He began trying to talk to other members of Unifor’s management team about the issue. In a cryptic signal message on Feb. 6 to 10 Unifor leaders, including Ms. Payne, Ms. Rizvi and Mr. MacDonald, Mr. Dias sent a photo of his wife. “She’s all I have left, please don’t take her away from me,” he wrote.
Mr. MacDonald told investigators he felt as if other union employees had stopped talking to him because they thought he should have been “protecting the union.” Others, he said, like Katha Fortier, another of Mr. Dias had been asked if he was available for confidential talks, which he interpreted as pressure to withdraw the complaint.
Ms. Fortier told The Globe that Mr. Dias did not order him to pressure Mr. MacDonald.
Ms. Rizvi also told investigators that Mr. Dias was pressuring his aides to help him make a deal with Mr. MacDonald. He said he got a call from Deb Tveit, another…