Postal workers give union strong mandate to strike by Saturday

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This article was published 27/06/2016 (2859 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Postal workers across Canada, including those in Manitoba, have voted strongly in favour of a mandate to strike as early as Saturday.

There are two bargaining units in the Canadian Union of Postal Workers — urban and rural. The national results of the mandate to strike showed the urban unit voted 94.19 per cent in favour and the rural unit voted 91.26 per cent in favour.

In Winnipeg, there were higher numbers in the mandate to strike as the urban unit voted 98 per cent in favour and the rural unit voted 100 per cent in favour of a mandate to strike.

Glenn Bennett, the Local 856 union president, said the local voting took place on June 2 and June 4. Voting across Canada was happening throughout this month with voting taking place in the last location on Sunday.

A CUPW media release noted that strike action could start Saturday if talks with Canada Post were to break down completely. A mandate to strike means union members have voted to give the union the power to call a strike at some point in the future but union members are not on strike yet.

“Despite all of the inaccuracies being reported by the media, the Canadian Union of Postal Workers (CUPW) has not yet indicated that there will be a strike. Many media outlets are referring to the postal disruption as a strike which is incorrect,” the press release stated.

“Many of Canada Post’s actions in recent weeks, such as contacting their customers to seek other means of moving their products, point more to a lockout than to a strike.”

Canada Post and the union have been in negotiations since December 2015.