Headlines

Laval, May 19, 2012 – Teamsters Canada Rail Conference (TCRC) which represents some 4,800 workers at Canadian Pacific has issued today a 72 hours strike notice that will take effect on May 23rd at 0:01.

Commuter trains in 3 Canadian cities (Vancouver WestCoast Express, Toronto Go Transit and in Montreal, AMT) may be interrupted despite the will of the union to maintain the service.

“We wrote to CP yesterday indicating that we would continue operating the commuter train service on all the lines without disruption,” said Doug Finnson, Vice-President of the Teamsters Canada Rail Conference (TCRC), who is representing CP’s workers. “CP has written to us today indicating they will not operate Commuter Trains in Montreal, Toronto and Vancouver. We are sorry that our employer has so little consideration for travelling public.”

On April 26, Teamsters announced that 95% of its members had voted to go on strike. The major issues are work rules, fatigue management, and the pension plan, which the employer wants to cut by 40%.

A number of crafts are affected, more specifically, conductors, yardmen, locomotive engineers and rail traffic controllers. Almost 4,800 could be on strike next Wednesday.

Freight rail will be disrupted by the work stoppage.

The Teamsters Union represents 125,000 members in Canada in all trades. The International Brotherhood of Teamsters, with which Teamsters Canada is affiliated, has 1.4 million members in North America.

-30-

Information:

Stéphane Lacroix, Director of Communications, Teamsters Canada

Office: 450-682-5521 x236

Dear Brothers and Sisters,

This is the first update concerning contract negotiations affecting our members on both CN and CP.

As many of you are aware the Collective Agreements for the RTCs on both CN and CP expire at the end of 2011. We have now entered in to contract negotiations on both properties and have in the last two weeks met with both CN and CP to exchange proposals and begin the process.

The CP committee met in Calgary on October 13th & 14^th with the next round being set for November 30^th, December 1^st & 2^nd in Calgary again.  The CN committee met in Edmonton on October 18^th and has set dates to meet again on November 2^nd & 3^rd. For your information, the respective Union and the Company proposals have been posted in each office. The Union’s proposals are based on the information and concerns given back to the respective negotiating committees by the members through a series of local meetings and surveys.

For many of you this will be your first introduction to the collective bargaining process. Attached is a basic guideline of the process as provided for under the Canada Labour Code.  It is important to remember that we have just met to exchange proposals and are very early in the process.

We will continue to update you with the progress of the negotiations through the Local Chairs and as well through our new website which is now up and running at http://rctc.teamsterscanada.ca/ .It is a work in progress and we will continue to make improvements and additions to it in the coming months. Any comments as to what you would like to see added to the site would be welcome.

Yours truly,

Shelly Brownlee
General Chairperson
TCRC/RCTC

Letter to Fred Green, CPR CEO, from Dan Shewchuk, President of TCRC.

TCRC Election Ballots will be mailed on November 30, 2010 and must be received in the post office box by 23:59 (EST) on January 11, 2011.

• Rules