A restaurant owner in Regina was surprised to learn his photo was being circulated in a Unifor union video called “Meet the Scabs”..Kalpesh Patel discovered a photo from his Facebook account was used in the video after receiving calls on January 10. Patel then contacted a lawyer who wrote a letter to Unifor asking them to remove his photo..Initially, Unifor defended the accuracy of the video but it was taken down from the union’s Twitter account and Mr. Patel’s likeness was edited out..Chad Zipchian, co-owner of Birmingham’s Vodka and Ale in Regina said they aren’t taking sides but said Patel and the restaurant would defend themselves after being wrongly identified as having anything to do with the strike or the replacement workers..Scott Doherty, Executive Assistant to the Unifor National President, acknowledged the mistaken use of Patel’s photo but did not offer any apology for the mix-up..“A photo of a person named Kalpesh Patel no longer appears in Unifor’s ‘Meet the Scabs’ video posted on Twitter. We are still trying to locate a photo of another individual with the same name who is working at the refinery for our next video, in an attempt to discourage scabs,” Doherty said in an emailed statement..‘Scabs’ or ‘replacement workers’ allow a company to continue operations while a union is on strike – or in the case of Local 594 who represents employees from Co-op Refinery in Regina, Saskatchewan – locked out..Doherty says unions aren’t breaking any laws when they publicize names and photos of people who cross picket lines..“To be clear, no one crossing a picket line has an expectation of privacy,” he said..“The Supreme Court of Canada has affirmed a union’s right to photograph scabs in (a) 2013 decision”..The case, Alberta (Information and Privacy Commissioner) v. United Food and Commercial Workers, Local 401 2013, SCC 62, upheld the Alberta Court of Appeal’s decision that the union’s right to freedom of expression was unduly hampered by the Personal Information Protection Act (PIPA) and granted a constitutional exemption..Local 594 president Kevin Bittman said his team did not make the video nor had they shared it through their social media channels.
