Strike settlement awaits new St. Clements council

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This article was published 27/10/2010 (5535 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

There will not be an early end to the strike by 33 employees at the RM of St. Clements.

Spokesmen for the RM and the union said a meeting will likely occur in the afternoon of Nov. 2, after the new council takes office.

But a union official said the strike occurred only after the council members twice rejected union requests to send talks to binding mediation.

D.J. Sigmundson, the RM of St. Clements chief administrative officer, said his focus is on today’s municipal vote, adding bargaining took a backseat when the administrative and public works staff went on strike Monday morning.

“There’s no one who can make a decision,” until after the election, Sigmundson said. “The council has been in limbo.”

The striking workers are members of the International Union of Operating Engineers’ Local 987. There are six administrative staff, 15 permanent public works staff and 12 seasonal and part-time public works staff.

The union set up a picket line in front of the RM municipal offices in East Selkirk.

The RM of St. Clements is a sprawling municipality that stretches from north of Birds Hill to Grand Breach provincial park. There are 10,000 permanent residents and a large number of seasonal residents with cottages along the eastern shore of Lake Winnipeg.

Belinda Blanchard, union negotiator for the striking workers, said the union twice offered to send the talks to binding mediation and each time elected officials rejected those offers.

Blanchard said the two sides had been bargaining for 11 months before the RM made its last-minute request Sunday for binding mediation, adding however the RM didn’t want the talks to begin until Nov. 2., where the union wanted to begin immediately.

Blanchard said the stumbling block in the talks was a lower wage increase for seasonal and part-time workers than that offered to the permanent public works staff. “In support of the seasonal workers, the others said they would not accept that kind of offer,” Blanchard said.

The RM had offered the public works staff a four-year contract, with permanent workers receiving 11 per cent while the seasonal and part-time workers between 6 and 7.5 per cent.

Sigmundson said the RM’s three senior managers are handling office responsibilities, adding public works functions have been curtailed.

“The weather is not expected to be a factor now but snow clearing could be affected because (the striking workers) do a fine job,” Sigmundson said.

The polling stations are being handled by staff hired specifically for the one-day job, he said.

aldo.santin@freepress.mb.ca