CN Continues to Stall Settlement with Teamsters
Published: December 1st 2009
Source: Teamsters Canada Rail Conference

Montreal, December 1st, 2009 – Late Sunday afternoon, the Teamsters Canada Rail Conference (TCRC) offered yet another possible solution to Canadian National Railway (CN) to resolve the present impasse between the parties. The first proposal made late Saturday was quickly rejected by CN. To again move the process forward, the TCRC offered another possible solution to CN which was again rejected.

“This is far too obvious; CN has never had any intention to negotiate and is simply waiting for government intervention to settle the issues. CN appears to be using the same tactics they resorted to during negotiations with CN conductors in 2007, which resulted in a strike as well” said Daniel J. Shewchuk, President of Teamsters Rail Conference (TCRC), which represents the 1700 striking locomotive engineers at CN. “We have offered a number of solutions but CN simply says “No”, each time. If CN had accepted our initial offer, the issues could have been resolved by now. Instead we are still at an impasse.”

The locomotive engineers at CN have been without a contract since December 31, 2008 and were forced to issue the strike notice when CN made arbitrary changes to their collective agreement on Monday, November 23, 2009. The change in the amount of miles required to be worked by locomotive engineers on a monthly basis was arbitrarily increased from 3800 to 4300 which would have immediately resulted in the loss of approximately 220 locomotive engineer positions.

The TCRC continues to look for options but “It is very difficult to negotiate with yourself”, said Shewchuk. “Our last offer presented to CN received the same response as our earlier offers. The Federal Government and the public should be asking CN why they wanted to force a strike rather than to negotiate.”

CN CEO H. Harrison received total compensation of $13.35 million in 2008 (Forbes.com) and to-date CN has posted a profit of 1.27 billion in 2009 (Globe and Mail).

Teamsters Canada Rail Conference represents 12,000 railway workers with major railroads and shortline railroads across Canada and affiliated with the 125,000 members in Teamsters Canada and 1.4 million members in North America with the International Brotherhood of Teamsters.


Information:
Daniel J. Shewchuk, President of Teamsters Canada Rail Conference
www.teamstersrail.ca
 

www.teamstersrail.ca