By Sammy Hudes
The ongoing Canada Post strike has reached the three-week mark as the two sides continue to trade proposals through a government-appointed mediator.
The work stoppage centres around a variety of issues, including disputes over wages and weekend delivery.
Here’s a snapshot of the issues underpinning the standoff between the Crown corporation and union.
Wage increases
The Canadian Union of Postal Workers, which represents 55,000 Canada Post workers, said at the start of the strike that wage increases must be kept in line with inflation, with cost-of-living adjustment payments rolled into the basic wage rate.
The union initially called for a cumulative wage hike of 24 per cent over four years. CUPW negotiator Jim Gallant said that figure has moved since the start of negotiations, but declined to comment on the union’s latest proposal.
“We have just lived through the worst cost of living crisis in a generation,” the union’s national president Jan Simpson said in a post on Tuesday.
Canada Post says it has offered what it calls “competitive” wage increases totalling 11.5 per cent over four years and more paid leave. It notes labour costs rose by $242 million in 2023, or about 6.5 per cent, compared with 2022.
The organization declined to comment on Thursday.
Weekend delivery
One of the main snags in negotiations has been a push to expand delivery to the weekend, but the two sides are at odds over how to staff the expansion.
Canada Post has pitched seven-day-a-week delivery as a way to boost revenue and “secure the future of the company” as it struggles to compete with other delivery companies.
The Crown corporation says it would staff weekend delivery shifts with a mix of new permanent part-time positions and some full-time, which would “create flexibility while not adding significant long-term fixed costs.”
But the union characterizes Canada Post’s proposals as “attacks on full-time work,” accusing the Crown corporation of wanting to increase the part-time mix to more than 50 per cent of the workforce. It says it is concerned some part-timers could be scheduled for as few as eight hours per week and wouldn’t be eligible for benefits until they reach 1,000 hours.
“Canada Post has every ability today to deliver parcels on the weekend, inside our collective agreement at straight time,” Gallant said in an interview.
“We think it can be done with full-timers … We’re just saying, ‘Instead of hiring 10 part-timers, you can hire three full time.”
Job security and retirement
The union has highlighted a number of its demands for better job security, including a request for “improved protections against technological change.” Gallant said Canada Post is “always looking for new technology” that could threaten workers’ duties.
“This loading and unloading of trucks by robots is one that they’re really, really looking at (and) forklifts that drive themselves through a plant,” he said.
“We’re always afraid.”
When it comes to retirement, CUPW says Canada Post wants new workers to accept a defined contribution pension plan, even though its defined benefit pension plan is overfunded by 140 per cent.
“All workers deserve the right to retire with dignity, and for us, that means postal workers — present and future — maintain their defined benefit pension plan,” Simpson said.
Canada Post says its proposals are “focused on protecting and enhancing what’s important to current employees … while protecting the defined benefit pension and their job security.”
Rural service
The union has said it wants job security rights for rural and suburban mail carriers in line with those granted to urban postal workers. It has outlined a number of issues affecting its Rural Suburban Mail Carrier bargaining unit, saying it wants an hourly rate system with appropriate time values, union involvement and “safeguards against (Canada Post’s) unilateral change.”
The union says Canada Post must maximize and maintain eight-hour routes for rural workers, grant improved rights for on-call relief employees, and uphold paid meal and rest period rights.
It says the Crown corporation must also ensure the bargaining unit’s involvement in service expansion projects. Earlier this week, Simpson called on Canada Post to commit to working with the union “to expand services at the post office including postal banking and electric vehicle charging stations.”
Safer working conditions
The union has demanded the full elimination of Canada Post’s “separate sort from delivery” system, which entails certain employees spending the entirety of their shifts sorting mail for letter carriers to go out and deliver — as opposed to carriers performing both tasks.
It says this system overburdens carriers, who as a result spend more time outdoors and potentially exposed to extreme weather events.
“Postal workers suffer the second highest rate of disabling injury among workers under federal jurisdiction, behind only the road transportation sector,” Simpson said. “Growing neighbourhood mail volumes and changing work methods like separate sort-from-delivery are only making things worse.”
The union has also proposed increases to short-term disability program payments and injury on duty payments, along with more paid medical days.
