(The following article by Chris Sorensen was posted on the Toronto Star website on April 3.)
TORONTO — Labor strife threatens to roil both of the country’s major railways as Canadian Pacific Railway Ltd.’s track maintenance workers move closer to a walkout and striking Canadian National Railway Co. conductors choose between a tentative one-year contract and a return to the picket lines.
The union representing track maintenance workers at CP warned yesterday that some 3,000 employees could be on strike by April 25 after mediated talks with the railway broke down last Friday. The workers inspect and maintain CP’s tracks and bridges, and have been without a contract since Dec. 31, according to the Maintenance of Way Employees Division of the Teamsters Canada Rail Conference.
Meanwhile, at CN, if a contract vote next week is negative, it could threaten CN-operated GO Transit trains running in Toronto.
At CP, while spokesman Mark Seland said the railway would be able to maintain “close to 100 per cent capacity” by replacing striking workers with managers, union leaders noted that rival CN made similar promises on the eve of a crippling two-week walkout by conductors in February.
“We’re coming into wash-out season,” said William Brehl, the president of the union division representing CP’s track maintenance workers. “There are 50 trains backed up right now in Vancouver because of all the [mud] slides and derailments they’ve been having in B.C.
“We’re the guys and the women who go out there and protect that track, making it safe for those trains to run.”
However, David Newman, an analyst at National Bank Financial, said he wasn’t too worried about the situation at CP, arguing the track maintenance workers are not as critical to the railway’s short-term operations as other employee groups. “It’s not the engineers or the conductors,” he said. “It probably won’t impede the running of the railroad that dramatically.”
At CN, meanwhile, the union representing about 2,800 striking conductors and yard service employees is scheduled to release the results of a ratification vote on a proposed one-year pact on April 10. Employees walked off the job in early February after contract negotiations became bogged down over productivity measures, but returned to work later in the month in order to avoid federal back-to-work legislation that was tabled in the House of Commons.
The United Transportation Union is recommending the tentative deal be approved, but union infighting has created mixed messages for employees and has made it difficult to predict the vote’s outcome.
If the tentative pact is voted down, the UTU has told workers to once again walk off the job, creating the possibility of a another round of rail service disruptions for chemical companies, miners, wheat exporters and forestry firms across the country.
CN warned last week its first-quarter earnings would be impacted by the February strike to the tune of 5 to 10 per cent. A CN spokesman said yesterday the company hopes the tentative deal will be ratified, but is prepared for another walkout.
Although a second UTU walkout would likely be short-lived – Ottawa’s previously tabled back-to-work legislation could be called up when the House reconvenes from its Easter break on April 16 – the union is warning things could be more disruptive this time around, particularly for Toronto residents.
Frank Wilner, a UTU spokesman, said a so-called “gentlemen’s agreement” that kept CN-operated GO Transit trains running in Toronto during the first walkout is no longer in place, meaning thousands of commuters in the Greater Toronto Area could be without service next week if a strike occurs.
Commuter rail users in Montreal would also be affected.