CN Railway employees to start strike votes with March deadline

Less than a week after a short-lived labour disruption at Canadian Pacific Railway Ltd., workers for Canada’s other major railway will hold strike votes starting next week, Unifor announced Thursday.

Unifor (formed through the merger of the Communications Energy and Paperworkers and Canadian Auto Workers unions) announced Thursday it “will be commencing strike votes” at Canadian National Railway Company, “as of early next week.”

Unifor represents more than 4,800 employees at Montreal-based CN Rail, which Transport Canada says accounts for 50% of all Canadian rail transport revenues in Canada.

 Canada’s rail system “interconnects a wide range of businesses, including shippers, terminal operators, transloaders, port operators, shipping lines, and trucking, all of which are part of a very complex and complicated supply chain,” Labour Minister Kellie Leitch said Monday in the Commons. She made her remarks in the context of the Rail Service Resumption Act, which would have required striking Canadian Pacific employees to return to work.

Canadian Pacific employees (including locomotive engineers and conductors) represented by Teamsters Canada are back on the job, with the union reporting it has agreed to enter a mediation and arbitration process.

“An arbitrator will be appointed by the federal government,” Canadian Pacific said Monday in a press release. “No further details are being released at this time.”

Regarding unionized CN employees, Unifor says it “will be setting a strike deadline close to end of March to allow CN customers to make alternative arrangements.” Unifor added the strike vote process could take up to three weeks. Unifor has six collective agreements with CN which expired Dec. 31.

“CN handles over $250 billion worth of goods annually and carries more than 300 million tons of cargo, serving exporters, importers, retailers, farmers and manufacturers,” CN reported Feb. 2 in a securities filing.

Its freight operations include petroleum and chemicals, metals and minerals, forest products, coal, grain and fertilizers, intermodal and automotive.

“The majority of grain produced in western Canada and moved by CN is exported via the ports of Vancouver, Prince Rupert and Thunder Bay,” CN reported. “The automotive commodity group moves both finished vehicles and parts throughout North America, providing rail access to certain vehicle assembly plants in Canada, and Michigan and Mississippi in the U.S. The Company also serves vehicle distribution facilities in Canada and the U.S., as well as parts production facilities in Michigan and Ontario. The Company serves shippers of import vehicles via the ports of Halifax and Vancouver, and through interchange with other railroads. “

The CN employees represented by Unifor include “mechanics, clerical workers, excavator operators, locomotive engineers (Savage Rail) and truck drivers,” Unifor said.

Unifor also represents 1,800 Canadian Pacific Railway employees who conduct safety inspections on all rail cars and locomotives, as well as maintenance and repairs. Those workers are in a legal strike position but Unifor reached a tentative agreement Feb. 14 with Canadian Pacific management. That agreement has yet to be ratified by the workers.

Teamsters Canada represents more than 3,000 locomotive engineers, conductors, trainmen and yardmen working for Canadian Pacific. The ruling federal Conservative government had planned to table back-to-work legislation, but a spokesperson for Labour Minister Kellie Leitch told Canadian Underwriter that legislation “is no longer moving forward in the House of Commons.”