Six months of negotiations have come to a head this week.
As of this morning, Coast Hotels has issued a 72 lockout notice to its hotels in Prince George, Nanaimo, and Victoria. The move is in response to a strike notice given by the Nanaimo location last Saturday, where employees struck for just one day.
UNITE HERE Local 40 will be staging a protest at the Coast Inn of the North on Wednesday afternoon to try and persuade the company to negotiate with them.
“We think that hotel guests, the community, and other unions are paying attention to this issue,” said spokesperson for the union, Octavian Cadabeschi.
“We are hoping that the more attention we draw to this, the more that the company will realize the best course of action is to sit down and talk to us.”
The union has set a deadline of midnight December 13th to reach a settlement and has called on the labour movement to pull business from hotels if no deal is reached. The company and the union have agreed to emergency mediation this week.
According to Cadabeschi, the lockout will affect more around 90 workers in the Northern Capital and more than 250 from all three locations combined.
The protest is being held at 4:30 pm on Wednesday at the Coast Inn of the North.
MyPGNow has reached out to Coast Hotels for comment but has not received a response as of this publication.