Canada is seeing a spike in strikes — and as tariffs and the affordability crisis continue to hit workers hard, unions warn of more action on the horizon.
Some labour leaders say that includes a potential battle with a federal government that has repeatedly sent them back to work.
“We’re preparing for the fight that’s ahead,” said Alisha Kang, president of the Union of National Employees. “The movement is done with lip service.”
After the Liberal government intervened to end several high-profile strikes at ports, rail yards and Canada Post, that tension hit a new level last month when Air Canada’s flight attendants defied Ottawa’s back-to-work order — with union leaders risking fines and jail time.
A deal was reached the next day.
Canadian unions marked Labour Day on Monday, when the fight for workers’ rights is traditionally celebrated, during a year that saw a shifting landscape, including numerous strikes and several back-to-work orders issued by the government.
In a statement released on Labour Day, the Prime Minister’s Office said it’s working with unions to “build Canada strong.”
“Workers are at the heart of this mission,” the statement read.
Prime Minister Mark Carney ran much of his election campaign promising to support Canadian jobs. But Kang said that hasn’t borne out in his first few months as prime minister.
“He is not our friend,” Kang said.
“He used us as a backdrop for photo ops, but now when the rubber hits the road, he’s not there to actually protect workers.”
Kiavash Najafi, an executive director with the Canadian Labour Congress, said a growing number of workers are willing to support strike votes.
“We’re facing job losses because of the trade war. Younger people are finding it harder and harder to find work. The cost of living continues to go up and people are feeling squeezed by that,” said Najafi, whose group represents more than three million unionized workers.
“People generally seem to have lost a lot of confidence in institutions and governments to be able to deliver results for them.”
According to Statistics Canada, a flurry of labour action this country hasn’t experienced in decades took place following the height of the pandemic. In 2023, the most recent year statistics are publicly available, the number of days not worked because of labour disputes jumped to 6.6 million — the highest level since 1986.
More back-to-work orders
That swell in strikes has also proved a sticky issue for the federal government, which has stepped in — often under pressure from employers and some members of the public — to send employees back to work.
In the last two years, the Liberals have relied heavily on Section 107 of the Canada Labour Code to end major labour disputes, most recently at Air Canada. The legislation gives the jobs minister unilateral power to intervene to maintain “industrial peace.”
Unions are taking Ottawa to court over its unprecedented use of those powers — sometimes days or even hours after a strike has begun — as a violation of the Charter right to strike.
Najafi says some of Carney’s decisions have “put him in a very difficult relationship with workers.”
Those include the prime minister’s order for the civil service to cut operational spending by 15 per cent by 2028. Unions say job losses have already started and they are speaking out about the cuts.
“We’ve had a pretty sharp uptick in labour mobilization that we haven’t seen in the past few decades,” said Barry Eidlin, a labour issues expert at McGill University.
“Once some started, you had a snowball effect.”
This comes after years of declining job quality and security, intensified over the last few years by the cost of living rapidly outpacing wages and a tight labour market following the pandemic, he said.
Eidlin said there aren’t signs yet the trade war’s impact on Canada’s economy has slowed that momentum.
He pointed to Air Canada flight attendants defying the back-to-work order as evidence.
“They bucked the trend and that got employers back to the table,” he said. “That could set a new precedent for other unions to continue to fight, but it also is going to push the federal government to find other ways to order workers back to work.”
Jobs Minister Patty Hajdu said early Saturday afternoon that she has invoked Section 107 of the Canada Labour Code to order binding arbitration between Air Canada and its union and has ordered operations to resume, hours after 10,000 flight attendants went on strike.
Jobs Minister Patty Hajdu has defended her decision to intervene less than 12 hours after the Air Canada strike began, saying she did not make the call lightly, but that Canadians had already paid a high price during other recent strikes.
“Although I know that some unions are angry, I know that they know we have done a lot of heavy lifting together and that work will continue,” Hajdu said in an interview with CBC News on Monday.
The minister pointed to the Liberal government’s decision to repeal Harper-era legislation that made it harder for unions to organize, along with updates to the Labour Code and ensuring sick days in federally regulated sectors.
The labour voice in Parliament
Hajdu also regularly references the Liberal government banning the use of replacement workers during a strike.
That legislation was one of the key policies brought in as a result of pressure from the NDP — in return for its support for the minority Liberal government.
But now the New Democrats, seen as the traditional voice for labour on Parliament Hill, are weaker than ever before.
The NDP lost all but seven of its seats in the last election — the party’s worst showing in its history. The race to replace former leader Jagmeet Singh kicked off this week, with the party set to choose a new leader in March.
Najafi, who previously worked for the federal NDP, acknowledged that unions now have less of a voice in the House of Commons to sway the Carney government’s policies on workers’ rights.
“Unfortunately that kind of leverage and power doesn’t exist in this Parliament,” he said.
“[Workers] want the government to succeed against Trump and his attacks on Canada. So we’re ready to work with the government.”
