Larry O’Brien has been blogging about the transit strike. Today’s entry is address to the members of ATU 279 and includes a link to a letter sent by Alain Mercier of OC Transpo to the ATU leadership. He continues to encourage the union to allow its members to vote on the offer.

Some people have responded, including several drivers and mechanics. While some of the comments are predictable union spew, some are quite reasonable and offer some insight into the union politics. Excluding the obvious union supporters, there were only a couple of comments suggesting that the City should give in to the union. Giving in would be the absolute worst thing they could do because that only sets things up for the ATU (or any other union) to hold the city hostage when they enter negotiations with the City.

William Seabrooke wrote the following comment:

I being a senior operator and being eligible to retire next year, didn’t bother voting on the first offer, yet was happy about the 98% refusal because of the idea of block booking. I heard nothing but horror stories about it. I believe the reality of the issue was that we had no idea about what it would look like. After reading your explanation Mr. Mercier it doesn’t sound that bad. It’s too bad that explanation was not made availble to us as members of ATU 279 prior to the first vote.

So, the union members voted without the full picture. The burden for that really falls on the union’s negotiating team, I think. If they didn’t feel they had enough information, they should have gone back to the City and asked for a simulation rather than tell their members the City’s offer is completely unreasonable.

A comment from a mechanic named Pat talks about how scheduling is handled in the garage, where it sounds like the schedule is controlled by the City. He seems to feel that what’s good for the goose is good for the gander, so to speak:

Hello Larry, I am a mechanic at OC. The City changes our schedule in the garage and there doesn’t seem to be a problem. Small out cry but not to much happens. I don’t understand, the schedule should have been changed through a booking and that way the drivers could be use to it before a contract is up. Is that not possible? Just wonder if you could change the wording in the contract since the statement is made that it’s not really block booking. And then change the schedule with the explanation that management has the right to manage.
I hope this will help in a way,
Thank You

Pat

The union members need to demand a vote on the offer since it appears they didn’t have all the information they needed to make an informed decision first time ’round. If their union officials refuse, then they should look closely at their union’s constitution and figure out how to force a meeting to be held even if the executive don’t want one. The ATU 279 executive is doing a disservice to its members if they don’t.

As you know, Local 279 of the Amalgamated Transit Union is on strike. Like many strike votes, not every member actually voted. The question begs to be asked: Do the bus driver’s who didn’t vote at all think the City’s offer is a bad deal?

Larry O’Brien is quoted in a CBC article as saying “We’re getting a lot of calls from drivers, who are saying, ‘We didn’t know what we were or were not voting on. We like what we’re seeing,'” and he’s challenging Andre Cornellier, head of the Amalgamated Transit Union local representing the drivers to put it to a vote.

So, what did the union actually tell its members about the offer before they voted?

It will be interesting to see whether there are any significant differences between the offer on the table now and the one that the union eventually accepts. I hope there are none.

By now you’ve probably heard a lot about the strike by OC Transpo drivers. It’s had a lot of coverage in the media and many people have written about it in their blogs. (I walk to work, or I’d have written about the strike sooner.) Its result has been to significantly increase the number of cars on the road in a city that already has too many cars on the road. Some people are carpooling, which is good for the environment, but work schedules are suffering. And even with carpools, the average commute is still longer than what it was before the strike started. Some of my co-workers are spending the better part of two or three hours each day travelling to and from work.

City parking regulations are being eased up for non-metered parking so that people don’t have to run out and move their cars every hour or two and some additional parking lots have been opened by the city. Picketers are hampering access to some of the park-and-ride lots, which is only further reducing any chance of sympathy the drivers might have had.

About ten years ago they city gave the drivers the right to determine their own schedules. This means that drivers with lots of seniority get the choice shifts at the expense of the others. As well, it is contributing to something like $8 million a year in overtime. Because of certain guarantees in their contracts drivers can arrange their shifts such that they end up being paid more hours than they actually worked. The city has caught on to this and wants to retake control of the scheduling in an effort to reign in the costs. In return for this change, the city is willing to give each driver a $2000 bonus because the overall operating costs will be lower.  (You can see the city’s final offer at the City of Ottawa website.)

The Amalgamated Transit Union, which represents the drivers and other OC Transpo staff, has been vocal about their downtrodden drivers.  The annual increases being offered are higher than I’m getting as a civil servant, so I don’t have a whole lot of sympathy for them. At least they’re keeping up with inflation. But the thing that really steams me comes from this quote:

“Most of the bus companies would never ever do anything that would be scabbing our members,” said Randy Graham international vice-president for the Amalgamated Transit Union Wednesday afternoon. “We’ll have to deal with it if it does occur. We have to do the things that we legally can do. And we will do it.”

You might think that this quote is referring to the City of Ottawa hiring scabs to drive buses while the union members are standing in the cold and you’d be wrong. Randy Graham is referring to the privately-operated shuttles the universities are operating to help their students get to their exams.

Yes, the Amalgamated Transit Union is targetting university students.

Classy, eh?

I’m sorry, but this single act is the reason why I will not respect an Amalgamated Transit Union strike line ever again. The universities have every right to run their own shuttles and the ATU has no right to block them.

Larry O’Brien is holding a press conference at 1:30pm today to talk about the strike. It’ll be interesting to hear what he has to say. Hopefully he’ll make it clear to the union that the drivers are welcome to stand in the cold for a long time.  Every week they’re on strike the city is saving a huge amount of money, so if they stay out long enough this might not be a bad thing.