Months of negotiations have so far failed to bear fruit. More than 7,000 terminal loaders and forty-nine employers in thirty ports in western Canada went on strike on Saturday, July 1, including Vancouver, the largest in the country.
Subcontracting, port automation and the cost of living are the main reasons behind the collective action taken by the International Union of Longshoremen and Storekeepers on this occasion.
“We didn’t take this decision lightly, but we had to do it for the future of our workforce,” said Rob Ashton, president of the union’s Canadian branch. However, he remains positive about the signing of a “collective agreement for the rights of the working class”, he added in a statement. Their collective agreement expired on March 31.
Cruise ships not affected by strike
For its part, the Maritime Employers Association of British Columbia, Canada’s westernmost province, says it has “repeatedly tried to be flexible and to find a compromise on essential priorities”, without success. . “We appreciate the assistance provided by the federal mediators to the parties and we remain open to any solution that will help reach a balanced agreement,” they said in a statement. On Friday, this association had indicated that a possible strike would not affect cruise ships docking in Vancouver, Prince Rupert and on Vancouver Island.
Members of the Maritime Employers Association transport all types of goods to Canada and the United States in particular, from automobiles to coal, grain and containers. If it continues, the strike could thus have significant repercussions on the North American market, but also on the world.
More than 500 million Canadian dollars (346 million euros) of goods pass through British Columbia ports every day, the association says on its website, or 16% of the goods traded by Canada each year. Vancouver alone allows the trade of approximately 305 billion Canadian dollars of goods annually and contributes to the gross domestic product of the country to the tune of 11.9 billion Canadian dollars.