From DTN Progressive Farmer, March 14:
Canadian Pacific Strike Would Devastate Canada's Cattle and Ag Industries
The potential for a Canadian Pacific strike is being watched closely by many industries, while the timing could not be worse for many sectors in Canada as well as the U.S.
Teamsters Canada Rail Conference (TCRC) on March 4 reported that it had completed and tallied the results of a strike vote. Of the membership, 96.7% voted in favor of strike action against Canadian Pacific if necessary. A legal strike could take place after midnight on March 16, 2022, at 00:01 a.m. EDT, noted TCRC.
TCRC reported on its website: "The main issues at hand include wages, benefits and pensions. The possible work stoppage affects more than 3,000 Locomotive Engineers, Conductors, Trainpersons and Yardpersons at Canadian Pacific Railway. TRC will continue to participate in the mediation process with the assistance of the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service (FMCS), and the next meetings are planned to take place between March 11 and March 16, 2022."
In response, Canadian Pacific (CP), on its website, said in a news release: "CP has an excellent track record of successful collective bargaining with our unions; unfortunately, the TCRC has relied on federal conciliation in eight of the nine collective bargaining negotiations since 1993. We have offered a fair and balanced agreement, including wage increases, for a two-year collective agreement, and have agreed to 20 union demands on benefits and work rules in order to achieve labor certainty and stability for the next two years."
CP said it is focused on arriving at a negotiated outcome that is in the best interests of all employees and their families, customers, shareholders and the overall Canadian economy. "The TCRC leadership, however, appears poised to force a shutdown of the essential rail supply chain, jeopardizing Canada's national economy, by making unreasonable demands," the company stated.
Both CP and Canadian National railways have struggled to recover from the major weather event that caused flooding, slides and track outages in British Columbia in mid-November. Despite reduced demand for grain shipping due to the sharply lower 2021 production, the railways have since failed to spot cars in a timely fashion, adding costs to grain movement and delays in loading at West Coast terminals at Vancouver and Prince Rupert....
....MUCH MORE
