(Reuters circulated the following article on May 19.)
VANCOUVER, British Columbia — Canadian National Railway’s Canadian locomotive engineers will vote in June on a proposed five-year labor agreement, a union official said on Thursday.
The company and Teamsters Canada Rail Conference worked out the final wording of the agreement on Wednesday, averting a strike by the 1,700 workers that would have disrupted freight and commuter rail service.
Ballots will be distributed to the workers in the next few weeks, and the union plans to count the votes on June 30, said union president Gilles Halle.
Details on the proposal have not been released, pending the ratification vote. The agreement will be retroactive to the end of 2003 when the last contract expired.
The agreement with the engineers was the final deal in a series of national labor agreements that Montreal-based CN needed to negotiate with its employees in Canada. The disputes did not involve CN’s U.S.-based workers.