(Reuters circulated the following article on January 16.)
CALGARY, Alberta — Canadian Pacific Railway Ltd. will cut nearly 400 management and administrative jobs, or 15 percent of head office positions, to boost productivity, the Globe and Mail newspaper reported on Monday.
The cuts would be in addition to 140 unionized train crew employees who are being laid off at Canada’s No. 2 railway due to weak coal shipping volumes and mild winter weather.
A CP Rail spokesman declined to comment on the report, which cited unnamed industry and labor officials, saying the company is in a quiet period leading up to the January 31 release of 2005 financial results.
With the staff cuts at the Calgary headquarters, CP Rail hopes to improve its performance against top rival Canadian National Railway Co., the report said.
The white collar cuts could start at the end of this month or later this year, it said.
At the end of 2005, the railroad completed a 30-month round of 820 job reductions across all departments.
CP Rail’s shares were up 12 Canadian cents at C$47.39 on the Toronto Stock Exchange.
In early December, CP was forced to claw back the lower end of its 2006 earnings target by 10 Canadian cents to a range of C$3.60 to C$3.85 a share, blaming supply issues at Fording Canadian Coal Trust, one of its biggest shippers.
Fording, the big metallurgical coal miner, had cut its own outlook due to a shortage of tires for its huge trucks.
Meanwhile, warm weather in CP Rail’s operating regions has cut the need for train crew workers, spokesman Len Cocolicchio said. Crews are normally beefed up to deal with equipment freeze-ups and heavy snowfalls, he said.
The crew reductions are expected to be temporary.
“It just reflects the fact that we now have the flexibility and agility in our business to move our workforce up and down to reflect the business conditions,” Cocolicchio said.