OUR HISTORY: THE GPMC | NMC
Over its 70+ years in operation, the GPMC | NMC has earned the trust of unions, employers and maintenance customers by providing stable multi-trade agreements that cover critical maintenance activities. The agreements adopt the basic monetary terms negotiated by the 13 unions in the alliance, and feature a cooperative, streamlined grievance process. They also incorporate a clause ensuring that there will be no strikes or lockouts to disrupt essential maintenance activities.
OVER 70+ YEARS IN SERVICE
It provides maintenance customers with the highly skilled tradespeople they need to maintain complex industrial facilities. It helps contractors develop pragmatic, flexible approaches to upcoming projects, and provides them with valuable information they can use to bid on maintenance work. And it offers skilled tradespeople the chance to earn good money in stable, long-term jobs that continue after construction is complete.
GPMC|NMC may not be a household acronym, but the organization plays an important role in the Canadian economy. GPMC|NMC agreements provide secure full-time employment for more than 14,000 skilled tradespeople and are worth $1.1 billion in wages and benefits each year. The organization works with more than 120 employers and has agreements in eight out of 10 Canadian provinces. The alliance administers maintenance agreements in key industrial sectors including oil sands extraction, oil refining, petrochemicals, mining, electricity generation, pulp and paper, natural gas processing, steel production and consumer product production.
The GPMC|NMC has been building trusting partnerships between owners, contractors and tradespeople since 1952, when it negotiated its first contract at what is now the Shell refinery in Sarnia, Ontario. By the end of the 1960s the alliance had agreements in four provinces and had expanded into the mining and chemical sectors.
During the 1970s and 1980s, it signed new agreements in the fertilizer and power generation sectors, expanded activities in Alberta, and added new customers in Nova Scotia and New Brunswick. By 1990, GPMC|NMC agreements accounted for more than seven million work hours annually. During the 1990s the number of work hours climbed to 10 million as new projects in Newfoundland and Manitoba came online.