If the lockout of dockworkers in Montreal persists, there will be “catastrophic” consequences for the Canadian economy, particularly in Quebec and Ontario, the local port authority warns.
On Monday morning, Port of Montreal CEO Julie Gascon held a news conference, less than 12 hours after the lockout began.
The lockout is the latest escalation in a labour dispute that has heated up in recent weeks. The Port of Montreal moves $400 million worth of goods every day and is Canada’s second busiest port after Vancouver, which is also mired in a labour dispute. A lockout also began there last Monday.
On Thursday, the Maritime Employers Association (MEA) tabled what it described as a final offer, which came with a 72-hour lockout notice.
The MEA threatened to lock out workers as of Sunday at 9 p.m. if they didn’t accept the offer.
The dockworkers overwhelmingly rejected the offer, with 99.7 per cent of members voting against it, according to a spokesperson for the Canadian Union of Public Employees.
Gascon said it’s only a “matter of days” before the effects of the lockout are felt on a daily basis by everyday people, not just the workers. She said the lockout directly affects 1,200 workers at the port, but 10,000 other workers who depend on the port’s flow of goods, like truck drivers and marine pilots, could also be caught in the dispute.
She also mentioned businesses, big and small, who rely on materials delivered through the port.
“Each container that is not moved here in Montreal is a missing piece in the Canadian economy,” Gascon said.
“Today, the lockout affects the logistics chain. Tomorrow, it’ll be the factories. After that, it’ll be the retailers.”
Some essential services like wheat transportation continue but most merchandise is frozen.
‘Dockworkers won’t get down on one knee’
Last week, the MEA said its newest offer includes a three per cent salary increase each year for four years and a 3.5 per cent increase for the two subsequent years. The association says those increases would bring the Montreal dockworkers’ total average compensation to more than $200,000 per year at the end of that proposed contract.
The association added that it wants dockworkers to provide at least one hour’s notice when they will be absent from a shift — instead of one minute — to help reduce management issues “which have a major effect on daily operations.”
The union representing dockworkers, the Syndicat des débardeurs du port de Montréal, dismissed the offer. It said it only contains “comestic changes” and doesn’t address issues around scheduling, a major sticking point in negotiations.
On Monday, a few hours after the Port of Montreal met with the media, the dockworkers’ union, held a news conference of its own. For more than a decade, no progress has been made on issues such as work-life balance and work schedules, declared Michel Murray, the union’s spokesperson.
“The lockout in Vancouver, the lockout in Montreal, we see as a co-ordinated, planned group effort to put pressure on the government to intervene in our case,” he said.
Asked about the salary increase proposed by the employer, Murray replied that it was “snake oil” and that it was not true that dockworkers could earn $200,000 at the end of the contract.
“To earn 200,000, a dockworker would have to earn $97 an hour all year round. The employer’s offer in 2029 is $51 an hour,” he said.
Murray described a “vengeful, contemptuous” employer, pointing to “1,200 disciplinary measures per year” and workers heavily monitored by surveillance cameras.
“As long as there’s no change in this 13-year-old philosophy, labour relations will remain the same and the dockworkers won’t break. Dockworkers won’t get down on one knee,” said Murray.
“Dockworkers will be proud to work and to give productivity when they are respected by the employers association and by these maritime companies.”
Murray says his group has been trying for three weeks to get the employer’s availability dates to resume negotiations.
On Monday, the MEA declined CBC News’s request for an interview.
Roughly 1,200 dockworkers at the Port of Montreal rejected a deal Sunday evening, triggering a lockout at Canada’s second-busiest port. It added to a string of labour disruptions including a lockout at the Port of Vancouver and a looming Canada Post strike.
‘The urgency is real’
The collective agreement between the maritime employers and the dockworkers expired on Dec. 31, 2023.
The labour dispute ramped up in late September, when the workers rejected an offer and approved a strike mandate.
Dockworkers went on a three-day strike on Sept. 30, closing two terminals — Viau and Maisonneuve — that handle more than 40 per cent of the port’s container traffic.
Since Oct. 31, the union launched an indefinite strike that has shut down those two terminals.
In a statement sent by his office on Monday, Federal Labour Minister Steven MacKinnon said the parties involved in this dispute must understand the “urgency of the situation and do the work necessary to reach an agreement.”
“Canadians are counting on them,” reads the statement.
The Chamber of Commerce of Metropolitan Montreal is urging the government to force the re-opening of operations at the Port of Montreal.
“With the holidays approaching, a crucial time for our companies, this situation is unfairly jeopardizing Canada’s robust and promising business models. Nearly $6 billion worth of goods are expected to arrive at the port over the next two weeks. The urgency is real,” reads a statement it sent on Monday.