Assahafa.com
Canada Post says operations will resume on Tuesday after the Canada Industrial Relations Board ordered a return to work.
Canada Post says it has agreed with the Canadian Union of Postal Workers to implement a five per cent wage increase retroactive to the day after the collective agreements expired.
Labour Minister Steven MacKinnon on Friday directed the CIRB to order the 55,000 picketing employees back to work if a deal wasn’t doable before the end of the year.
Canada Post says the board determined negotiations between the Crown corporation and the Canadian Union of Postal Workers are at an impasse after two days of hearings over the weekend.
It says union members have been ordered back to work under their existing contracts, which have been extended until May to allow the bargaining process to resume.
Labour Minister Steven MacKinnon announces he’s asking the Canada Industrial Relations Board to order operations at Canada Post to resume if it agrees that the contract dispute is at an impasse. MacKinnon also says he is tapping an independent commissioner to examine the structure of the corporation, along with the collective agreement, and produce recommendations ‘on the way forward.’
The union did not immediately respond to a request for comment about the resumption of work.
It said on Friday that MacKinnon’s intervention was part of a troubling pattern in which the government lets employers off the hook when they don’t bargain in good faith with workers and their unions.
Canada Post, union for striking workers make their case at labour board hearings
The strike began Nov. 15. Federal mediation was put on hold Nov. 27 after mediators concluded that the sides were too far apart.
Business groups had been calling on the government to intervene as companies and individuals scrambled to find alternative modes of delivery with the holiday shopping season in full swing.
Source: cbc
