London, Ont. Dr. Oetker workers to go on strike Wednesday: union

Hundreds of workers at London’s Dr. Oetker frozen pizza plant are expected to hit the picket line Wednesday morning.

It comes after members of the United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) Local 175, which represents about 251 people at the east London facility, rejected the company’s final offer in a vote held on Saturday.

Unionized workers at the plant, which opened nearly eight years ago and manufactures millions of frozen pizzas every year for the German multinational, will be in a legal strike position at 12:01 a.m. Wednesday.

Global News has contacted representatives for UFCW 175 for comment.

In a statement on their website, UFCW Local 175 said members at the London plant gave their negotiating committee an 88 per cent strike mandate in November. Workers at the plant joined UFCW in 2018.

“The committee returned to the bargaining table seeking equal increases across the board for the employees at the plant, as well as higher wage increases in each year of the proposed agreement term,” the statement says.

Global News reached out to Dr. Oetker but the company declined to comment.

The plant, located just southwest of Bradley Avenue and Veterans Memorial Parkway, opened in 2014 and is described by the UFCW as a “production hub for the (Dr. Oetker’s) North American pizza operations.”