The B.C. Maritime Employers Association served its employees with a lockout notice, effective November 5th, 8 am Pacific, after the International Longshore and Warehouse Union Local 514 served its own 72-hour strike notice late last week.
The last contract between the employers and union members expired in March 2023.
The strike/lockout includes 700 foremen based at several ports in B.C. including Canada’s largest, the Port of Vancouver.
Labour disruptions at the Port of Vancouver have been on-going this year, as an earlier 13-day strike impacted consumer goods and grain movement, and a dual railway strike in August also disrupted traffic in and out of the port.
The BCMEA says that cruise and grain movement will not be impacted by the lockout notice. Bulk grain movements from licensed grain terminals are not impacted as per section 87.7 of the Canada Labour Code, says Wade Sobkowich, executive director of the Western Grain Elevator Association. However, any grain — such as pulses or soybeans — in containers is not covered under the code.
Fertilizer Canada is sounding the alarm regarding this latest labour disruption at ports, saying that these ports are vital for exporting potash to overseas markets, moving over 21,000 Mt daily.
“A shutdown will cost the industry $9.7 million per day in lost sales revenue. Another disruption to Canada’s supply chains further damages our reputation as a reliable trading partner and jeopardizes food security around the world. Disruptions also damage our trading relationships, providing an advantage to our competitors and potentially ceding market share to Russia and Belarus,” says Fertilizer Canada.
The potential West Coast ports shutdown comes at a time when the Port of Montreal is also facing labour disruptions. Union members there began an on-going strike on Thursday after one-day strikes failed to prompt a deal between the Association des employeurs maritimes (AEM) and the dockworker’s union CUPE local 375.
“The potential lockout at British Columbia container terminals beginning November 4th is catastrophic for Canada’s pulse sector,” says Greg Cherewyk, president of Pulse Canada. “This stoppage combined with the strike at two terminals at the Port of Montreal is jeopardizing the Canadian pulse industry’s 1.4 million tonne container export program in its peak shipping season.
We cannot continue to endure this type of damage to our Canadian supply chains and expect to be treated by our major markets as a serious and reliable exporter of pulse crops. It’s time to discuss long-term solutions to Canada’s labour issues that continue to negatively impact farmers, exporters and our overall economy.
For now, the clock is ticking. Minister MacKinnon and the federal government must act immediately to avoid the irreparable harm this stoppage would cause to Canada’s economy,” Cherewyk says.
A rep for the International Longshore and Warehouse Union Local 514 is calling the threat of lockout an “overreaction” and says that the BCMEA is creating a crisis.
“Our members have repeatedly tried since our contract expired on March 31, 2023 to bargain a new contract without any job action but the BCMEA employers have refused to move and now want to create a crisis instead of negotiating,” says Frank Morena, in a union press release dated Oct. 31, 2024.
Representatives of the employer association says it has offered a total 19.2 per cent increase in wages in a new four-year agreement — which would be from April 2023 until March 31, 2027. The new agreement would also include a 16 per cent increase to the retirement benefit, a 10 per cent increase to employer contributions to the welfare plan and an average $21,000 lump sum for eligible employees that includes backpay since the contract expired.
In a press release Sunday, the union said that this offer was contingent on removing existing parts of the collective agreement, which it did not accept.
The BCMEA says that if this offer is not accepted, any subsequent offer will no longer include the signing bonus lump sum payment and the wage offer will change from 4 per cent to 2 per cent in years 3 and 4, respectively.
