Port of Montreal Employers Warn of Lockout If Final Offer Rejected

Dow Jones11-08
 

By Robb M. Stewart

 

OTTAWA--Employers at the Port of Montreal plan to suspend operations at Canada's second largest seaport if dock workers don't accept a revised offer aimed at breaking an impasse and ending a strike that has cut into cargo shipments.

The Maritime Employers Association said it has submitted a final offer to the longshore union that includes a cumulative pay increase of more than 20% over six years. It has given the union until Sunday evening to reply and said that if there isn't an agreement then only essential services and activities unrelated to longshoring will continue.

The union, Canadian Union of Public Employees local 375, said the two sides have been summoned by the federal mediation service to a meeting Friday morning to discuss the final offer and the employers' threatened lockout.

The employers association said it is proposing a 3% salary increase a year for four years and a 3.5% rise for a subsequent two years, retroactive to the beginning of 2024. Increases would also apply to the current pension plan and benefits, it said.

Business groups across Canada worried about the hampering impact on trade have called on Ottawa to intervene to break the impasse in Montreal and another labor dispute on the country's west coast that has frozen the movement of cargo at British Columbia terminals, including at the country's busiest port in Vancouver.

The union representing more than 700 port supervisors will sit down with the British Columbia Maritime Employers Association on Saturday after labor leaders were contacted by federal Labor Minister Steven MacKinnon. Port employers locked out the supervisors Monday after they launched a ban on overtime work.

MacKinnon has criticized the insufficient pace of progress in both sets of talks, which he said indicated a concerning absence of urgency from the parties. He said all sides needed to reach an agreement quickly.

The work stoppage in British Columbia risks close to 800 million Canadian dollars, the equivalent of about $577 million, per day in trade that flows through West Coast ports. The Maritime Employers Association estimates that close to C$400 million in goods pass through the Port of Montreal each day.

Hundreds of dock workers at two terminals at the Port of Montreal went on strike at the end of October, shuttering about 40% of container traffic. Members of the port's longshore union have also halted overtime work.

The Montreal employers group said that by the time its proposed contract expires, average compensation for a longshore worker at the port would be more than C$200,000 a year. In exchange, it said it is asking for dock workers to provide at least one hour's notice of absence instead of one minute before a shift.

Efforts to agree to a new collective agreement for workers at the Port of Montreal began more than 13 months ago.

In British Columbia, the collective deal covering members of the International Longshore and Warehouse Union local 514 expired at the end of March 2023. Employers there last week made what they said was a final offer that would raise wages by 19% over four years and included an average C$21,000 lump-sum payment, as well as increases in the retirement benefit and meal allowance for workers.

 

Write to Robb M. Stewart at robb.stewart@wsj.com

 

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

November 08, 2024 10:55 ET (15:55 GMT)

Copyright (c) 2024 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.

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