Canadians should start receiving mail again on Tuesday, after Canada Post workers shift from nationwide strike action to a rotating strike on Saturday morning.
The Canadian Union of Postal Workers, which represents 55,000 Canada Post employees, says the battle for a fair collective agreement continues, but that the downgraded labour action allows workers to resume their jobs and remind Canadians that a full postal service is worth fighting for.
“[With] the majority of our workers back to work, people are able to go out and talk to the public,” said Jim Gallant, a CUPW negotiator. “The public sees what worth there is in the post office.”
The union and Canada Post have been trying to negotiate a new collective agreement for more than a year and a half. But that’s not the union’s only battle. Postal workers launched a nationwide strike two weeks ago — the second since last year — after the federal government announced sweeping changes to the Crown corporation.
Ottawa has called for Canada Post to end home delivery and close some rural mail outlets to stabilize the indebted company and ensure its survival. The Crown corporation hasn’t been profitable since 2017, reporting a $1.3-billion loss last year. It says it’s on track to lose $1.5 billion this year, staying afloat with a $1-billion government loan. (CUPW has suggested Canada Post is embellishing some of these figures. The company didn’t respond to CBC’s request for comment on the claim.)
CUPW has pledged to fight Ottawa’s announced reforms to Canada Post, and is hoping Canadians take up the cause.
“[Ottawa is] going to cut the arms and the legs off of it. The service is not going to be what it’s supposed to be. It’s not going to be what Canadians need,” said Gallant. “Canadians need to call their MP; they need to go to their city council.”
Labour expert Rafael Gomez says the union faces a difficult challenge: negotiating a new collective agreement while also drumming up public opposition to Ottawa’s planned cuts.
“You have to balance it out because if it’s not going to be disruptive, then the employer has no real cost to bear,” said Gomez, an employment relations professor at the University of Toronto. “If it is too disruptive, then the public is affected.
“It’s this balancing act.”
Watch out for mail delays
CUPW’s Gallant says the rotating strikes will delay mail delivery in some parts of Canada. He also hinted that workers could resume a nationwide strike at any point.
“Different people [will be off work] continually over the next while, until either we have a collective agreement or the union decides to change our strike activity,” he said.
Still, the resumption of mail delivery is welcome news for Kathryn Gallagher Morton, founder of Maplelea, a small business that sells online Canadian-themed dolls.
She’s set to mail out tens of thousands of print catalogues next week featuring her dolls, the biggest driver of the business’s holiday sales.
“I was thrilled,” said Gallagher Morton, of when she heard the news. “It just makes a huge, huge difference to our company and what we’ll be able to do this Christmas.”
However, she says she won’t be sending a letter to her local MP, asking the federal government to save the traditional postal service.
Gallagher Morton says she lost over $300,000 in sales due to last year’s strike, prompting her to switch permanently to private delivery for most doll deliveries. Although she still relies on Canada Post to deliver catalogues, she says that like Ottawa, she supports a downsized postal service.
“I’m a Canadian who pays taxes and I think that the government should operate as fiscally responsibly as possible,” she said. “The whole world has to shift. Times are changing, and I think Canada Post needs to change its model.”
Still, some rural communities heavily reliant on Canada Post worry a smaller operation would impact many of their residents.
Lori Hoddinott, the mayor of McNab/Braeside, told CBC News in September that 60 per cent of her rural community, located just west of Ottawa, largely consists of older farmers who rely on home delivery. Cutting that service would create hardships for them, she said.
“If it’s on the senior to get down the laneway and go 15 kilometres up rural winter road to get to the mail, they’re not going to do it every day,” she said.
Canada Post has said it’s maintaining its program that allows for people with mobility issues to arrange for options like weekly home delivery.
Canada Post responds
Canada Post said in a statement on Friday that it welcomes back its employees, but has warned customers of “uncertainty and instability” in service due to the rotating strikes.
The Crown corporation also said it’s ready to return to the bargaining table, and that it’s still waiting to hear back from the union on its latest offer, made on Oct. 3.
It includes a 13.59 per cent wage increase over four years, health and retirement benefits and up to seven weeks of vacation. But the offer also removes a signing bonus that the corporation says it can no longer afford.
The union representing 55,000 Canada Post workers has announced it will end its Canada-wide strike action and move to rotating strikes starting this weekend. The Canadian Union of Postal Workers says the change will ‘start mail and parcels moving.’
CUPW said last week in a statement that the latest proposal is taking “major steps backwards.”
However, Canada Post has made no indication it plans to sweeten the deal, and it continues to support the government’s plan for a smaller postal service.
“The need to align the business to the current needs of the country, to reduce the dependency on taxpayer dollars, grows more urgent each day this strike continues,” it said in a statement.
