Diageo lays off 103 Amherstburg employees

CTV Windsor: Diageo lays off A strike has been avoided for now, but half the workforce at Diageo will watch from the sidelines. Rich Garton reports.

Workers at Diageo in Amherstburg have been issued layoffs.

Unifor Local 2098 president, D.J. Lacey, tells CTV News, 103 unionized workers have received layoff orders from the bottling company; something Lacey says is a better alternative than a strike.

In this case workers can still collect employment insurance.

The contract with the company expires Friday at midnight and to avoid walking off the job, the union has extended their strike deadline to Feb. 12.

Lacey says the layoffs are fairly common around this time of year, due to the company stock piling product. He says in 2008, all 260 workers at Diageo were laid off for the exact same reason.

Contract talks continued Friday; it remains unclear when employees will return to work.

CTV Windsor has reached out to Diageo for comment; they have not yet returned our calls.