Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said the federal government was “appalled” by the longshoremen’s union leadership’s rejection of a deal that sought to end the strike at British Columbia ports.
Mr. Trudeau described Thursday as “unacceptable” the decision of the union executive to reject the tentative agreement of a federal mediator which had been agreed to at the bargaining table, thus putting the members in a strike position.
“The impact on workers, families and businesses across the country from this extended strike has been significant,” he said during a scrum in Belleville, Ont.
Uncertainty continues to hang over activities at British Columbia ports, the West Coast’s main gateways for imports and exports, since the International Longshore and Warehouse Union Canada’s leadership caucus rejected mediator terms on Tuesday, briefly sending workers back to the picket line.
This decision was deemed illegal by the Canada Industrial Relations Board, which led the union to issue a new strike notice of 72 hours on Wednesday, only to cancel this notice a few hours later.
The union, which represents around 7,400 port workers, said its caucus did not believe the tentative agreement “has the ability to protect our jobs now or in the future”, and it asked to return to the bargaining table. He also promised to appeal the decision of the Industrial Relations Board.
Trudeau called a meeting of the Incident Response Group on Wednesday, a decision reserved for crisis situations.
The Prime Minister said the government needs to make sure people have confidence in the collective bargaining process.
“We know the best deals are always found through negotiation at the table and that’s what we focus on,” he said. But we also know that this strike could not continue and we are happy to see that the union is reconsidering the good offer that was on the table and the agreement that was accepted by both the union leadership and the [partie patronale]. »
The strike originally began on Canada Day and lasted 13 days, halting or severely disrupting operations at more than 30 BC port terminals and other sites where union members work, crippling the transportation of billions of dollars worth of goods.