Ministers defend "mind-blowing" bid to restart Canada Post
Canada’s government yesterday defended its move to impose a wage deal on postal workers providing lower annual wage increases than had been offered by Canada Post. Members of the House of Commons debated legislation yesterday that seeks to break the deadlock between Canada Post and 48,000 urban members of the Canadian Union of Postal Workers, and end the nationwide shutdown of postal operations.
The back-to-work legislation would impose a four-year contract on the union, through to January 2015, starting with a 1.75% annual increase in year one, rising to a 2% increase in the latter two years of the deal.
An arbitrator would be appointed to decide on the details of the contract, including employment terms and conditions.
Yesterday, opposition MPs described it as “mind-blowing” that ministers should impose a labour contract based on wage increases below the 1.9% offered by the Crown Corporation.
Responding to the criticism, Prime Minister Stephen Harper said: “The wage rates laid out in the legislation are the same as this government negotiated with its other public sector employees.”
Bargaining
Junior minister Kellie Leitch said during yesterday’s debate that despite the terms of the legislation, Canada Post and the union were free at any time to agree their own collective bargaining agreement.
She suggested the legislation could even push the parties back to the negotiating table.
However, Yvon Godin, a former labour representative for United Steelworkers and now NDP Member for Acadie-Bathurst, said Canada Post now had incentive to hold out against a deal with the union, since it could wait for the government contract to be imposed offering lower wage increases.
“The government has taken away any possibility of bargaining. With its proposed bill, it is interfering directly with negotiations instead of finding a bargaining mechanism,” he said.
Ministers said yesterday the shut-down of Canada Post was currently responsible for a shrinking of Canada’s GDP of 0.21% per week, putting the damage to the economy at up to $31m per week.
“Some might argue that we should wait, that we should let collective bargaining run its course no matter how long it takes,” said Leitch. “That is unwise. The risks to our economy are too great to ignore.”
Although opponents are trying to delay the back-to-work bill, the government is hoping its legislation will pass the House of Commons tomorrow or Friday, before going through the Senate. A resumption of mail services is, as a result, unlikely to occur until at least next week.
However, there are suggestions that a national holiday in Quebec on Friday could delay the bill’s passage further.
It might just be me, but Yvon Godin doesn’t know what he’s talking about. For the last while, all news reports indicate that wages is not even a point that is being disagreed on anymore. If the arbitrator sides the union, than even with those wages lower than what CP was offering, the Union will have won. Canada Post still has plenty of incentive to negotiate as some of the Union demands are unrealistic.
Pretty long odds on the arbitrator siding with the Union – it is one side or the other and I can’t recall a time when an arbitrator sided with the Union in regards to back to work legislation.
CUPW’s demands where all but muted, the morning after the Conservative Government won its majority.