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HomeNewsLocal postal workers union still caught in stalemate with Canada Post

Local postal workers union still caught in stalemate with Canada Post

The postal workers union representing 150 members in Prince George says not much has changed over the past three weeks with Canada Post.

This comes despite a top federal mediator joining contract talks for five consecutive days and now Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has vowed jump in if no solution is made.

Local CUPW President Clark Rasmussen believes it’s a never a good sign when Ottawa decides to get involved.

“We don’t favour that, we were told by Trudeau and the Liberals that they would not get involved and would stay an arm’s length away with the opportunity for us to negotiate and get a new deal at the table and not have the government step in.”

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“The second time around (with the mediator) we had something there but on Thursday, Justin Trudeau came out and said he’ll have to do what he has to do as far as helping out things, which he previously stated he wasn’t going to get involved and I think that took a lot of pressure off the corporation to negotiate in good faith.”

To make matters worse, postal workers in Vancouver walked off the job again today, Rasmussen says a lot of the union’s main issues are being ignored.

“Number one, we never wanted to be in this position and we brought stuff to the table, we also brought solutions to the table as well and the corporation continues to say no.”

“We’ve got carriers and plant workers across this country that are working up to 12 hours and the volumes have gone through the roof. As I said, they are making millions of dollars but they are not putting the manpower where it’s needed, so that is one of our leading issues.”

Canada Post reached out to My Prince George Now and have provided the following statement:

Despite lengthy discussions and continued proposals by Canada Post to respond to the union’s demands through three rounds of mediation, we are still no closer to a deal.

The Corporation has made significant offers to CUPW that include increased wages, job security and improved benefits, and it has not asked for any concessions in return. We value the relationship with the union and have responded to their major demands with meaningful improvements and a commitment to continue to work together to find solutions that address the changing nature of the work and the health and safety of employees.

It’s important that we move forward together to resolve negotiations in a manner that treats employees fairly and ensures the postal service remains strong without putting an unreasonable financial burden on our customers.

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Impact on Service

Unfortunately, the growing impact of the union’s rotating strikes on postal operations across the country means Canada Post must suspend its service delivery guarantees until further notice.

We will continue to make best efforts to deliver, but the union’s strike efforts have caused significant backlogs and delays throughout our network. As of today, our major processing centre in Vancouver was shut down from Friday evening to Tuesday morning and Toronto is now shut down, significantly impacting our ability to process mail and parcels. In Toronto alone, more than 180 trailers full of parcels, packets, and mail sit idle as the union shuts down the facility for the third time in less than a month. Striking to shut down a processing facility not only impacts our operations at that location, but it also chokes the flow of mail and parcels to our delivery facilities.

We apologize for the inconvenience and are advising customers to expect delays. We remain committed to serving Canadians and will continue to do everything possible to minimize the impacts of the union’s strike activities.

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