Members of the Canadian Union of Postal Workers picket outside the Canada Post Pacific Processing Centre, in Richmond, B.C., on Nov. 27. The federal government says it is not planning to intervene to resolve the labour dispute at Canada Post, that has around 55,000 workers on the picket line calling for a 'fair wage' and better working conditions.DARRYL DYCK/The Canadian Press
François Laporte is the national president of Teamsters Canada. Paul Boucher is the president of the Teamsters Canada Rail Conference.
In recent weeks, corporate leaders have claimed that Canada is in the throes of a crisis of “labour disruptions,” citing examples from ports, airlines, railways and, most recently, Canada Post.
But underpinning those disruptions is a troubling trend.
The transportation industry’s most powerful chief executives have developed a way to sidestep union negotiations. Here’s their playbook, as we see it: Make unreasonable demands, accuse unions of being unreasonable for refusing to accept them, instigate job action, lock workers out to disrupt supply chains, and use the resulting outcry to press Ottawa to impose binding arbitration. We believe this to be bad faith bargaining.
In other words, large corporations have weaponized lockouts – not to press workers, but to strong-arm politicians. It’s a tactic we’ve seen unfold five times this year alone, at WestJet, Canadian Pacific Kansas City Ltd. (CPKC) CP-T, Canadian National Railway Co. CNR-T and the ports of Montreal and Vancouver.
Take negotiations at CN, for example. The company put forward a series of unreasonable demands, including the power to forcibly relocate workers across the country for months at a time – uprooting families to address labour shortages in remote areas where CN had failed to hire and retain sufficient staff. We opposed these demands and others, only to be accused by CN of lacking the “desire to reach a deal.” The company then locked us out in August, disrupting supply chains. They had been publicly asking for binding arbitration since June.
Federal politicians, despite their rhetoric about protecting workers’ rights, routinely buckle under the pressure from companies. At the first sign of disruption, politicians abandon their supposed progressive principles and accept the false narrative that Canada’s economy teeters on the brink of collapse the minute the ports or trains aren’t quite running on time.
This argument is overly alarmist and fundamentally flawed. Canada is a strong country, with an economy far more resilient than these corporate narratives suggest. History shows Canada has withstood weeks-long strikes, without significant impacts on store shelves. Tribunals have even ruled that rail and port workers do not qualify as “essential service” employees. Unlike nurses or firefighters, nobody is going to die if transportation workers are on a picket line.
People forget that workers have a constitutional right to engage in collective bargaining. By repeatedly forcing unions into binding arbitration rather than forcing corporations to bargain in good faith, Ottawa is treading in dangerous legal waters. Our union and others have already filed court challenges and we’re prepared to go all the way to the Supreme Court.
Labour disputes, while inconvenient, have been an essential part of securing fair treatment for workers. In an era of soaring corporate profits and stagnant wages, strengthening collective bargaining has never been more urgent.
Work stoppages are exceedingly rare in Canada’s federally-regulated private sector, with usually more than 93 per cent of collective agreements being negotiated without disruptions.
Labour disputes will come about from time to time in a free and democratic country. They should be expected and managed accordingly. Unlike other types of disruptions, they at least ensure working conditions are kept fair and decent, leading to social and economic benefits for all Canadians. In the long run, these benefits far outweigh their cost.
Luckily, large corporations already have all the tools they need to avoid labour disputes: Simply address workers’ concerns and offer fair wages. This should be achievable for companies like CPKC, which paid its CEO Keith Creel more than $20-million last year – close to 160 times the company’s median salary.
Mr. Creel has been among the loudest voices demanding government intervention to prevent workers from exercising their right to bargain. But his stated concern for Canada’s economy and trading reputation deserves closer scrutiny.
During the last round of bargaining, CPKC demanded pay cuts and the rollback of safety protections – demands we firmly opposed.
On Aug. 9, in response to our refusal to accept an agreement detrimental to workers' interests, CPKC issued a lockout notice. Adding to this, under a little-known provision of the Canada Labour Code, the company threatened to change the terms of our collective agreement and suspend our grievance procedure, rendering the entire contract de facto unenforceable.
To safeguard our members' rights, we had no choice but to issue a strike notice. Contrary to Mr. Creel’s public claims, however, this strike notice came nine days later, on Aug. 18 – after the lockout notice and threats to gut the agreement.
By making unreasonable demands at the bargaining table, threatening to dismantle our collective agreement, and ultimately locking out his own employees, what did Mr. Creel expect, if not a supply chain disruption?
Bosses hate the spotlight collective bargaining shines on their shoddy safety records, their payouts to executives and shareholders and the accountability negotiations demand.
Ultimately, it’s the workers who operate the trains, fix the planes and deliver the goods. Listening to corporate voices over these workers is indefensible.
It’s time for the government to stop caving to corporate pressure. Instead, it must stand with workers, enforce good-faith bargaining and uphold fairness and democracy.