Derek Kilbourn
Sounder News
On Thursday, Sept. 26, the Canadian Union of Postal Workers (CUPW) launched a national strike following an announcement by the Federal government announcement transforming Canada Post.
Earlier in the day on Sept. 26, the Honourable Joël Lightbound, Minister of Government Transformation, Public Works and Procurement, issued the following statement approving the following changes to Canada Post:
• Letter Mail Delivery Standards: Canada Post will introduce flexibilities to reflect today’s lower volumes. The average household receives just two letters per week, yet operations remain designed for far higher volumes. The Ministry says adjusting standards so that non-urgent mail can move by ground instead of air, the corporation will save more than $20 million per year.
• Community Mailbox (CMB) Conversions: The government is lifting the moratorium on community mailbox conversions. Currently, three-quarters of Canadians already receive mail through community, apartment, or rural mailboxes, while one-quarter still receive door-to-door delivery. The Ministry says Canada Post will be authorized to convert the remaining 4 million addresses to community mailboxes, generating close to $400 million in annual savings.
• Postal Network Modernization: The moratorium on rural post offices, in place since 1994, will also be lifted. The rural moratorium was imposed in 1994 and covers close to 4000 locations. It has not evolved in 30 years, but Canada has changed. The Ministry says this means that areas that used to be rural may now be suburban or even urban, but are still required to operate as rural post offices. There was no specific criteria provided in the Minister’s announcement on how Canada Post would evaluate each post office designation.
Jan Simpson, National CUPW President responded to the proposed changes saying, “the Minister emphasized the importance to serve all Canadians, but these recommendations will only undermine public service. We have no details on how any of them will be implemented.
“Converting more addresses to CMBs makes little sense when customers want their parcels to the door. The Government has completely failed to consider the problems it faced a decade ago when CPC last tried to convert door-to-door to CMB delivery.”
CUPW members on strike in front of the Gabriola Post Office. Derek Kilbourn photo.
“The announcement also ignores how changes to delivery standards could impact mail volumes and confidence in service. And it fails to consider the importance of the moratorium on post office closures to help ensure universal service.
“These recommendations could result in major job losses. On this, the Minister simply dodged questions from reporters.”
According to Simpson, late Friday afternoon, the federal mediators told CUPW that Canada Post needed more time to formulate its new global offers.
“Canada Post will let us know Monday morning whether we will meet Wednesday or Thursday to receive the new offers.
“According to the federal mediators, Canada Post needs time to take into consideration Minister Lightbound’s September 25 announcement.”
Canada Post issued a statement on Monday stating CUPWs proposals would add billions in additional costs.
The corporation states it has faced $5 billion in losses from operations since 2018, wriring in the statement that, “the company cannot agree to CUPW’s counter offers of August 20, which maintained or hardened the union’s position on many items.”
According to Canada Post, CUPW’s offers would:
• Add significant new costs – more than $700 million a year ($2.8 billion over the four years of the agreement) in new operating costs. This includes unchanged wage demands, new benefit improvements, new vehicles, and other items.
• Add increased paid time off work – 17 personal days (up four days), which would be in addition to current vacation leave (up to seven weeks) and statutory holidays. These additional personal days are included in the $2.8 billion in additional costs.
• Add additional full-time employees – eliminating or severely restricting the use of contracted services and instead hiring them as CUPW-represented employees. Also, any new services would have to be staffed by CUPW-represented employees.
• Severely restrict the ability to adapt operations to current needs – any organizational change would be considered a “technological change” and be subject to the strict rules and restrictions against technological changes in the collective agreements.
• Protect pay for time not worked (trapped time) – with no mention of dynamic routing or load-leveling, letter carriers would continue to be paid for eight hours of work, even if volumes mean they finish early. The Industrial Inquiry Commission final report said: “There is no persuasive case to be made that any business – especially an effectively insolvent business – should be put in a situation where it must pay people for 8 hours a day and not be able to reassign them to other work should they finish early (or where it is anticipated they will do so).
Canada Post issued warnings to customers regarding the nationwide strike, which will see a freeze on all Canada Post letter and package deliveries.
According to the crown corporation, mail and parcels will not be processed or delivered for the duration of the national strike, and some post offices will be closed. Gabriola’s will remain open, but staff are unable to send or receive mail off island.
Service guarantees are suspended for items already in the postal network. Scheduled pickups have been cancelled. No new items will be accepted until the national disruption is over.
All mail and parcels in the postal network will be secured and delivered as quickly as possible once operations resume.
However, a national strike of any length will impact service to Canadians well after the strike activity ends. Processing and delivery may take some time to fully return to normal.
Canada Post says it will post regular updates at canadapost.ca/negotiations
CUPW is releasing their updates at www.cupw.ca
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