Canadian National, union sign deal, end strike

Montreal-Canadian National Railway (CN) and the Teamsters Canada Rail Conference (TCRC) on Dec. 2 signed an agreement to end a five-day strike by locomotive engineers. The strike began Nov. 28. The agreement provides for continued negotiations for a defined period of time in an effort to resolve the outstanding issues with a process that would require mutual agreement between the parties to submit any of the outstanding issues to arbitration. Wages and benefits, if unresolved, will be submitted to arbitration. “The most contentious issue of having the mileage cap raised to 4,300 miles per month was resolved at the last minute,” said TCRC President Daniel Shewchuk. “Despite the threat of impending back-to-work legislation, it was made clear that any increase to the mileage cap would not result in an agreement,” he added. CN will roll back the monthly mileage cap for locomotive engineers to the previous 3,800 miles from the 4,300-mile cap initiated Nov. 28, and withdraw its plan to apply a 1.5 percent wage increase to TCRC members. The union’s current contract expired on Dec. 31, 2008.