Canada Post and union agree on settlement
Canada Post and its postal workers union reached a deal early Wednesday on a settlement framework for a contract, avoiding a national strike or lockout of thousands of corporation employees.
Canada Post and the Canadian Union of Postal Workers have agreed to finalize a tentative agreement in the next 72 hours.
The agreement on the framework came about 3 1/2 hours after the third deadline extension had elapsed.
Details of the agreement were not released.
Both the union and Canada Post had maintained throughout the talks that they wanted to avoid job action.
When the first deadline of Thursday midnight passed, the two sides agreed to continue talking.
Canada Post proposed a settlement late Friday and the Canadian Union of Postal Workers agreed to continue talks through the weekend. The deadline for strike action was again extended late Sunday to Monday at midnight and then again to Tuesday.
Job security, benefits, wages, retirement, workload and safety were key issues on the table.
The last strike at Canada Post, just prior to Christmas 1997, ended when the federal government introduced emergency back-to-work legislation.
The Canadian Union of Postal Workers represents some 48,000 Canada Post employees. Canada Post delivers 37 million pieces of mail each day to more than 31 million Canadians, located at almost 14 million addresses and over one million Canadian businesses from coast-to-coast.
