MONTREAL — Canada's two biggest railways say they’re preparing to get trains back on track after Ottawa intervened to end an unprecedented labour impasse that disrupted business across the country and upended commutes for thousands.
Canadian National Railway Co. said in a statement Thursday it has ended the lockout of workers that began earlier in the day.
The move came shortly after Labour Minister Steven MacKinnon said he asked the Canada Industrial Relations Board to impose binding arbitration to resolve the dispute and kickstart rail shipments.
CN said that while it’s still waiting for the formal order from the board, “the company is making this decision (to do so now) to expedite the recovery of the economy.”
CN had earlier asked for binding arbitration and said Thursday it "was disappointed that a negotiated deal could not be achieved at the bargaining table despite its best efforts.”
Canadian Pacific Kansas City Ltd. had also asked for binding arbitration.
In a statement, it said: "Our teams are already preparing for the safe and orderly resumption of our rail network and further details about timing will be provided once we receive the CIRB’s order."
CPKC president Keith Creel added that while they respect collective bargaining, “given the stakes for all involved, this situation required action.”
The union felt otherwise, framing Ottawa's decision as a move to “sidestep” it.
"Despite claiming to value and honour the collective bargaining process, the federal government quickly used its authority to suspend it, mere hours after an employer-imposed work stoppage," said Paul Boucher, president of the Teamsters Canada Rail Conference.
The union was "deeply disappointed by this shameful decision," he said.
The labour relations board summoned the two railways and the union to a virtual meeting Thursday night, according to the Teamsters and a corporate official who was not authorized to speak publicly on the matter.
MacKinnon, exercising powers under the Canada Labour Code, announced he had asked the board to impose final, binding arbitration in the dispute involving the union and the two companies.
MacKinnon said he had also asked the board to order the railways to resume operations under the terms of the current collective agreements until new deals were in place.
He said the collective bargaining process was the best way to resolve such disputes, but stressed that the effects of the lockout were too punishing and widespread to ignore.
"Millions of Canadians rely on our railways every day," MacKinnon said. "The impacts cannot be understated, and they extend to every corner of this country."
MacKinnon’s comments were echoed by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. “Collective bargaining is always the best way forward. When that is no longer a foreseeable option — when we are facing serious consequences to our supply chains and the workers who depend on it — governments must act,” Trudeau wrote on the social media platform X.
MacKinnon said the Liberal government would also examine the underlying reasons for the work stoppage. "It is the government’s responsibility to ensure industrial peace in this critically vital sector. Thus, we will be examining why we experience repeated conflicts in the railway sector and the conditions that led to the parallel work stoppages we are seeing," he said.
The work stoppage marked the first time the two carriers had shut down operations at the same time.
The decision to end it did not sit well with the NDP, which is helping prop up Trudeau’s Liberal minority in Parliament. NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh, in a post on X, said the move "sends a message to big corporations like CN & CPKC: Being a bad boss pays off."
Singh added: "Justin Trudeau's actions are cowardly, anti-worker, and proof that he will always cave to corporate greed."
Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe and his Alberta counterpart Danielle Smith, whose provinces depend on rail for commodity shipments such as wheat and potash, said on X the federal government did what was necessary.
Moe called it “the appropriate action” and Smith said, “Each day this disruption continues will have costly impacts on our economy, workers, businesses, families and farmers.”
In British Columbia, Premier David Eby had called the stoppage "terrible news," both for the families of locked-out rail workers and those whose commutes and industries were affected.
Pressure from industry and government to resolve the impasse has been mounting for weeks.
Just after midnight Thursday, the two rail carriers locked out close to 10,000 employees, including engineers, conductors, dispatchers and yard workers after the two sides failed to agree to a new contract. CPKC workers began a strike at the same time, said MacKinnon.
Each side has accused the other of failing to negotiate seriously. The union had said it did not want binding arbitration because the issues were too critical to be left to a third party.
Rail workers from Halifax to Vancouver set up picket lines Thursday morning, while sign-toting employees demonstrated outside CN's headquarters in downtown Montreal and CPKC's head office in Calgary.
Railways ship about $1 billion in goods each day, according to the Railway Association of Canada. Most of the 180,000-plus railcars that CN and CPKC haul weekly — moving everything from cars to clothes, computers, wheat and fertilizer — were already sidelined by Wednesday under a phased wind-down that began last week.
Credit rating agency Moody's warned the work stoppage would cost the Canadian economy $341 million per day, with agriculture, forestry and manufacturing among the hardest-hit sectors.
The impasse also affected about 32,000 commuters in Toronto, Montreal and Vancouver whose lines run on CPKC-owned tracks. Passenger trains cannot roll along those rails without the 80 locked-out traffic controllers to dispatch them.
The Teamsters represent 6,000 CN workers and 3,300 CPKC workers. The two companies typically hammer out new deals with employees a year apart. But in 2022, CN asked for a yearlong extension to the current collective agreement, moving the bargaining periods into lockstep.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Aug. 22, 2024.
Companies in this story: (TSX: CNR, TSX: CP)
— With files from Morgan Lowrie in Montreal and Bill Graveland in Calgary
Christopher Reynolds, The Canadian Press
