Striking posties don’t let weather deter pickets
By Al Beeber - Lethbridge Herald on November 26, 2024.
Herald photo by Al Beeber
Striking postal workers huddle around portable gas firepits as they try to stay warm along the picket line Monday morning outside the downtown post office building.LETHBRIDGE HERALDabeeber@lethbridgeherald.com
With propane firepits for warmth, local postal workers continued to carry pickets downtown on Monday morning.
Canada Post on Monday said in a release that the Crown corporation is down nearly 10 million parcels since the Canadian Union of Postal Workers walked off the job on Nov. 15.
Canada Post, in a media update, said that number will increase as the strike continues and Canadians look elsewhere to have items delivered.
It also stated that progress was limited after talks continued on the weekend.
Cole Morgan, chief shop steward of Canadian Union of Postal Workers Local 770, told The Herald on Monday morning that “by and large the public supportive” but at the end of the day the union is fighting for workers rights as a whole.
“The corporation has been in a position where they have bargained in a method that they’re waiting for the government to step in. So it’s not really any different than they’ve done in the last several contracts,” said Morgan.
The strike is not only hard on Canadians wanting to get their Christmas mail delivered and waiting to have parcels delivered but on union members themselves.
“I’ve got three kids of my own and a single income family so it’s really tough, it’s really stressful,” added Morgan.
Morgan said he’s been made aware that Canada Post has been issuing layoff notices to some workers “so in spite of the fact that we’re exercising our legal right to strike, they’re essentially breaching the labour law.”
The CUPW website Monday described the calls to members informing them of layoffs as “merely a scare tactic by management.”
The union added “we urge members not to panic if you receive such a call. Instead, take note of what the management representative says and then request a record of employment and estimated date of return in order to allow you to apply for EI benefits.”
The wintry weather was not much of a deterrent to picketers with many of them mail carriers who are outside anyway, noted Morgan.
“It’s not hugely different from that perspective. We’d be rather servicing our customers than walking around downtown certainly but at the end of the day we’re acclimatized to the cold and we’re ready to be out here as long as we need to,” added Morgan.
Canada Post said its proposals to offer seven-day-a-week parcel delivery and “other important improvements” are crucial to its future because that would allow the corporation to grow its parcel business.
Proposals would also create new regular part-time jobs with schedules “providing greater opportunities for temporary employees to become permanent, with guaranteed hours and eligibility for health and pension benefits,” Canada Post stated.
According to the corporation, labour and benefits “consumed” more than 70 per cent of the corporation’s revenues in 2023 with labour costs rising by $242 million last year, or 6.5 per cent, compared to 2022.
The corporation has lost more than $3 billion since 2018 and posted a $315 million loss before tax in the third quarter of this year.
CUPW says it is seeking fair wages and safe working conditions along with “the right to retire with dignity, and the expansion of services at the public post office.”
It also wants 10 paid medical days added to members’ seven paid personal days and for Canada Post to allow those medical days to be banked.
It’s also seeking significant improvements to group benefits plans “including increased coverage for health specialists, fertility treatment, gender-affirming care, vision care and more.” It also wants improved protections against technological change and harassment and no contracting out.
For urban operations it wants full elimination of separate sort from delivery as well as time to prepare and deliver neighbourhood mail and paid meal and rest periods for workers on the job five hours or longer, among other requests.
For rural and suburban mail carriers, CUPW wants job security, an hourly rate system “with appropriate time values, union involvement, and safeguards against CPC’s unilateral change” and it wants the corporation to maximize and maintain eight-hour routes, among other requests.
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When water flows and reaches a block or a barrier, it naturally diverts and finds another way to its destination. Regardless of the reasons for the strike, whether justified or not (I am not informed on the issues), consumers are going to find other means to get their letters, packages, etc. where they need to go, thereby rendering already expensive Canada Post services even less relevant, and more obsolete.
If the strike creates minimal impact because other options out there fill the gap/void they are trying to create to make their point, then what they are actually highlighting is that CP has become less (non?) essential because for the most part life goes on without their services.
This strategy will likely only result in even greater losses than the $300 million posted this year because people will mainly stick with their new solutions after the strike, I would guess, especially if they are more efficient and cost effective than using CP. This would make it even harder to fund the changes being sought via the strike.
Seems to be a self-defeating plan.