|
April 1, 2020
Transportation Workers Defend
Their Rights and the Rights of All
  
Trucking Industry
• Trucker Safety and
Well-Being Must Be Ensured - Normand
Chouinard
Airline
Workers
• Air Canada Flight
Attendants Demand Safety Be Prioritized
- Garnet Colly
Public
Transit Workers
• Toronto Workers Fight
to Improve Health and Safety Protections for
All
• Transit Windsor
Workers Reject Mayor's Decision to Suspend Bus
Service - Amalgamated Transit Union
Local 616
Trucking Industry
- Normand Chouinard -
On March 18, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau
announced the "temporary closure" of land, air
and sea borders effective at midnight March 21
for all non-essential travellers. The
announcement came after a telephone conversation
between Trudeau and U.S. President Donald Trump
that same morning, just a few hours before the
U.S. administration announced it was also
closing its borders.
"We are working very closely with the United
States at this time to introduce specific rules
that will keep both Canadians and Americans
safe," Trudeau added. "Travel restrictions will
not apply to commerce or trade," he noted.
"Our governments recognize that it is critical
that we preserve supply chains between both
countries," Trudeau continued. "These supply
chains ensure that food, fuel and life-saving
medicines reach people on both sides of the
border. [...] Trucking will not be affected by
this new measure."
The Need to Ensure the Safety of All
For Prime Minister Trudeau to say in the same
breath during his March 18 press conference that
the Canadian and U.S. governments will "keep
Canadians and Americans safe" while stating that
"trucking won't be affected" is disingenuous.
While everyone recognizes the need during the
present period to ensure the safety of all, the
safety of the workers who are ensuring, 24/7,
"that food, fuel and life-saving medicines reach
people" by truck, is not being looked after.
Prime Minister Trudeau had nothing to say about
the safety of truckers, nor about how their role
as essential workers is going to be ensured
during the pandemic. Truckers are very concerned
about these matters and are holding public
authorities and employers to account for
guaranteeing that their right to safe working
conditions during this difficult time is
protected. As transportation falls mainly under
federal jurisdiction, it is the responsibility
of the Trudeau government to meet the needs of
transportation workers. On that issue, François
Laporte, National President of Teamsters Canada,
which represents a large number of drivers
employed by transport companies, had this to say
in a press release:
"To date, the federal government has not
consulted with the union on how to protect
transportation workers. No federal safety
guidelines have been made available to protect
truck drivers, who need to travel to the United
States and across the country to keep Canadians
supplied."
"Every store in the country depends on
deliveries from truck drivers. If we fail to
protect truckers from the virus, our country's
supply chain will collapse and we won't be able
to get food and other essential goods to
Canadians," he warned. "Our union stands ready
to help in any way possible."[1]
The decision by certain U.S. states to close
public rest areas and the possibility that truck
stops operated by private interests may do
likewise has met with strong disapproval from
truckers across North America. Not only union
organizations but also thousands of truckers who
have a presence in the trucking world through
digital platforms, have voiced strong opposition
to these arbitrary decisions. Truckers are
rightly claiming that as an essential service
for securing the supply chain, strict measures
must be taken to protect them under current
conditions. Amongst other measures, special
protective equipment must be provided to them
and sanitation measures taken so that employees
performing regular cleaning of rest areas are
safe, along with measures that ensure that
truckers can eat properly and that workers
employed at these restaurants can work safely.
Some truck drivers are even demanding that
public authorities take responsibility to
provide this and ensure that the owners of rest
areas comply with health regulations.
 Truckers are also
demanding that their rest periods be respected,
which is absolutely essential for them to be
able to continue their work without risking
their lives and the lives of others. This
concern arose following the decision of the U.S.
government to temporarily suspend the
hours-of-service laws at the federal level that
mandate how many hours truck drivers may work, a
change that went into effect on March 13. Now, a
similar exemption has gone into effect in
Canada. On March 24, Michael DeJong, Director
General of Transport Canada's Multimodal and
Road Safety Programs, signed the Essential
Freight Transport Exemption. It applies to
"extra-provincial truck undertakings and their
drivers, who are employed or otherwise engaged
in the transport of essential supplies and
equipment, in direct assistance to the emergency
relief efforts during the response to COVID-19"
in all provinces and territories and remains in
effect until April 30.[2]
A number of proposals have come from truck
drivers themselves, including that of rotating
hours within the company, and that businesses
take all the measures necessary so that drivers
are not unnecessarily exhausted. Within the
context of the current pandemic, certain sectors
of the industry will be slowing down, so truck
drivers from those sectors will be called on to
lend a hand to the essential transport and
distribution sectors, such as health care and
agro-food, and fuel and other materials
necessary for production.
Truck drivers are also demanding that measures
be taken in reception and shipping areas in
factories, warehouses, distribution centres,
etc., to ensure social distancing norms. Many
truck drivers are concerned that they may
contract the virus while their trucks are being
loaded or unloaded, or that they themselves
might become vectors for its spread across North
America. These measures are all the more
important as truckers travel to areas of higher
risk, where the danger of spreading the virus is
even greater.
There has been much confusion and concern about
whether or not Canadian truck drivers who
contract COVID-19 in the United States will be
protected by insurance companies. Crisis
committees comprised of the transport industry
and unions, along with government and transport
ministry officials have reassured truckers that
they will be covered. The Canadian Life and
Health Insurance Association (CLHIA) has
confirmed what the public authorities have said.
"With restrictions to non-essential travel
beginning in the coming days, Canada's insurers
want to be clear that commercial truckers will
not lose their group out-of-country medical
coverage due to recent travel restrictions,"
said Stephen Frank, President and CEO of CLHIA.
Doubts about insurance coverage arose after
several insurers sent memos indicating that due
to the government's notice of travel
restrictions, they would not be providing travel
coverage for COVID-19. The uproar that this
created, not only amongst truckers but also
fleet managers and trucking and trucker
associations, has resulted in truck drivers
crossing the border now being covered for
COVID-19, so long as they have no symptoms
before crossing.
Truck drivers are aware that their job of
securing the supply chain goes hand in hand with
the need to take care of everyone working on the
production chain. It is the entire industrial
and non-industrial working class that produces
all of the goods and services upon which the
society depends who must be protected to ensure
that the people can be supplied with what they
need so that this pandemic crisis can be
overcome for the benefit of all. Truck drivers
will continue to work in that vein, by putting
forward themselves what they need to be able to
do just that.
Note
1. Teamsters
Canada
website.
2. Canada's Commercial
Vehicle Drivers Hours of Service Regulations
state:
12 (1) No motor carrier shall request,
require or allow a driver to drive and no
driver shall drive after the driver has
accumulated 13 hours of driving time in a day.
(2) No motor carrier shall request,
require or allow a driver to drive and no
driver shall drive after the driver has
accumulated 14 hours of on-duty time in a day.
Mandatory Off-duty Time
13 (1) No motor carrier shall request,
require or allow a driver to drive and no driver
shall drive after the driver has accumulated 13
hours of driving time unless the driver takes at
least 8 consecutive hours of off-duty time
before driving again.
For details on the March 24 Essential Freight
Transportation Exemption to the above
regulations, click
here.
Airline Workers
- Garnet Colly -
In its March 22 bulletin, the Air Canada
component of the Canadian Union of Public
Employees (CUPE) demanded that the full
gamut of personal protective equipment (PPE) be
provided to its flight attendants.
The union acknowledges that after months of
calls for increased personal protection
equipment onboard, and courageous efforts of
members who stood up for their rights, Air
Canada is now going to provide one N95
respirator per crew member.
 The bulletin
states: "The Union demands that the employer
provide our crews with the full gamut of PPE
required to safely conduct their duties and, in
doing so, take care of our customers by:
"- Providing the regulatory-required fit
testing to ensure N95 respirators are correctly
sized to our members, ensuring maximum
protection;
"- Establishing an opportunity for on-site
training to assist employees with understanding
the do's and don'ts of donning and removing this
PPE;
"- Providing a clear explanation of when the
N95 respirator provides maximum benefit."
The workers also demand that Air Canada provide
all "additional universal precautions equipment
that is crucial to full protection -- over and
above what is contained in the UPK [Universal
Precaution Kit] kits -- including additional eye
visors and full-sleeve smocks which are used by
other professionals when in close proximity to
persons suspected of contagious disease."
The bulletin goes on to state: "The Union's
position is that this PPE should remain a staple
of our onboard personal protective equipment
ALWAYS so that we never have to put ourselves at
risk for weeks on end in the future. We must
NEVER turn our backs on this hazard."
Discussing the issue of social distancing
onboard the aircraft, the bulletin quotes a
decision from Transport Canada about Air
Canada's practice of requiring flight attendants
to work in close proximity to passengers during
the pandemic. The decision follows the
investigation of multiple work refusals. It
reads:
"Requiring Flight Attendants to come frequently
into close proximity with passengers during the
COVID-19 outbreak, in order to provide regular
service, with no possibility of social
distancing presents a serious threat to their
health.
"Therefore, you are HEREBY DIRECTED, pursuant
to paragraph 145(2)(a) of the Canada Labour Code,
Part II, to alter the activity that constitutes
the danger immediately."
As of March 31, CUPE Air Canada component
President Wesley Lesosky told CBC that the
workers still "don't have properly fitted N95
masks, we don't have properly fitted gloves and
we don't have things such as disposable
long-sleeve isolation gowns that should be made
available to our crews." Speaking to the Huffington
Post, Lesosky noted that the workers are
in a "highly stressful situation because we're
not trained in a pandemic. We are trained in
dealing with someone who shows signs of the flu
or how to perform primary first aid, but we're
not trained on how to move through an isolation
stage on a plane. We don't have a place to put
people."
The CUPE Air Canada component raised a related
problem in its bulletin dated March 23,
indicating its concern that the On-Board Service
Managers (OBSMs) and Mentors are still being
placed on their aircrafts. These are staff hired
by Air Canada to provide so-called support for
the crew members but who actually interfere as
they have no functional role onboard.
The bulletin says: "What support can they
possibly offer that our highly skilled cabin
crew cannot? Why would we want, at this time, to
have them interacting with our customers? We
should be focusing on the well-being of each
other, limiting contact and practising safety
first and always. Now is not the time to be
augmenting crews, adding unneeded 'assistance'
on board or at layover points. This is the time
to remove the programs and move forward with
what we do best, SAFETY. [...] As a practical
reality there is no value to have OBSMs
travelling throughout the system and offering
support to our members currently facing massive
job reductions, especially when they have no
functional role onboard. We will continue to
impress upon the Company in no uncertain terms
why it makes sense to reconsider the OBSM
Program under the circumstances."
An additional issue that now confronts Air
Canada workers is the company's March 30
announcement that it will be laying off 15,200
unionized workers and 1,300 managers for April
and May, citing flight cancellations caused by
the COVID-19 pandemic.
Public Transit Workers
In the early hours of March 12, about a dozen
Toronto Transit Commission (TTC) workers
collectively refused to work at a TTC streetcar
facility over concerns about some work being
done to deep clean the streetcars. The overnight
work refusal at the Roncesvalles streetcar
facility was investigated by the provincial
Ministry of Labour, which gave the all-clear for
employees to return to work. Carlos Santos,
President of the Amalgamated Transit Union (ATU)
Local 113, which represents 12,000 public
transit workers in Toronto and York Region, said
in a statement that the refusal was "based on
maintaining reasonable precautions" to protect
workers. "The work refusal allowed for stronger
standards for workers' health and safety," he
said.
On its website, ATU Local 113 details measures
it secured to improve health and safety
protections for all workers and riders.
 "Since the threat
of the coronavirus was known, ATU Local 113 has
demanded that the TTC do everything it can to
ensure a safe, clean and healthy work
environment for all members. After weeks of
persistent demands from ATU Local 113, the TTC
agreed on March 18 to allow workers the choice
of wearing protective masks on the job. This is
an important measure ATU Local 113 secured to
help members protect their health at work. Other
safety measures include all-door boarding on TTC
vehicles because it helps avoid overcrowding at
entrances and provides safe distancing for TTC
workers and riders. Fare collectors and CSAs
[customer service agents] can remain in booths
for as long as they wish for any health and
safety concerns. Along with these protective
measures, ATU Local 113 has secured important
policy changes from the TTC, including 100 per
cent pay if members must go into 14-day
quarantine or self-isolation (assessed on a
case-by-case basis), no medical notes required
for sick days up to and including March 31,
2020, reassurance that all members will receive
the standard 75 per cent sick pay if unwell, and
increased workplace cleaning and disinfection
processes where needed.
"As our country faces unprecedented measures to
combat the coronavirus pandemic, our members are
showing up to work to ensure TTC riders --
including health care workers -- can get to
their destinations safely. And behind the
scenes, our maintenance members are working hard
to keep the TTC system clean and safe, including
vehicles, stations and other work areas."
- Amalgamated Transit Union
Local 616 -
On March 26, the Mayor of the City of
Windsor, Drew Dilkens, announced that public
transit services will be suspended as of the
end of normal operation hours on March 29, as
a measure to limit the spread of COVID-19.
This in spite of the fact that in the City of
Windsor's Pandemic Emergency Plan Transit
Windsor bus service is listed as an essential
service. The suspension will be in place until
at least April 13. The day after the
announcement was made, Windsor-Essex Medical
Officer of Health Dr. Wajid Ahmed issued a
media release indicating that the
Windsor-Essex Health Unit "has not recommended
the discontinuation of transit services. Under
the right circumstances, such as employing
appropriate environmental cleaning practices
and managing the number and space of
passengers, public transit can serve as an
important means of transportation to access
food, supplies, or go to work for essential
workers who may not have a private vehicle or
other options. Individuals who are high-risk
for contracting COVID-19 such as seniors (65+)
and individuals with underlying medical
conditions should not take public transit and
should try to arrange for delivery of supplies
to their home."
Dilkens claimed that the transit union has
prevented city workers from sanitizing buses
and cited this as one of the major factors
that influenced his decision to shut down
public transit amid the COVID-19 pandemic. In
an attempt to pit workers against one another,
the Mayor claims the city wanted to use the 30
per cent of City of Windsor workers,
represented by CUPE, who are currently at home
and getting paid, but not working and says
that Amalgamated Transit Union (ATU) Local 616
demanded that their members be used. "They
said we have to hire more of their members or
that we have to bring them in on overtime,"
Dilkens claimed. ATU Local 616 issued the
press release below on March 27, speaking for
themselves amid the anarchy being created, to
clarify the matter. They indicate that this is
not the case and that its workers have done
their utmost to keep the service running
safely for the public despite many challenges
and that the matter is not one of pay.
***
 In response to
the Mayor's statements, it is very clear that he
does not know the facts surrounding the current
operation of Transit Windsor. In the Armed
Forces this is called reverse psychology (if he
does not know, that means blaming others for
their own mistakes), we will present the facts.
This pandemic has spread throughout the world
at an unprecedented rate and has been a grave
concern for all. As front line workers, all of
our members are going above and beyond, along
with nurses, doctors, retail workers and truck
drivers putting ourselves in harms way for the
greater good of all the communities around the
world.
We do not know if the Mayor is aware that our
members were not provided hand sanitizers for 3
weeks and when Transit Windsor finally provided
them, they were expired. The members of ATU 616
were not provided with masks or disinfectant
wipes which we have continually asked for.
Management has continually given excuses as to
why they cannot be provided instead of doing
everything they can to get the basic essentials
needed to protect us from harm.
Our members are scared, yet they have continued
to come to work to provide the service this
community so desperately needs. Some are even
sending their children to live elsewhere for the
time being or finding other living arrangements
[so] as not to expose their loved ones to the
dangers that they face on a daily basis during
this outbreak. They come to work every day to do
their due diligence and to do their job with
pride in knowing that they are doing their part
in helping on the front lines. The Union has
approached Transit Windsor Management daily and
so many emails have been sent to the Executive
Director of Transit Windsor telling him what our
members are willing to do for him and willing to
do for the corporation. The Skilled Trades staff
even agreed to take a pay cut to help in
cleaning buses and our members have worked
almost to the point of exhaustion to keep the
public and the members of this Union safe and
have continually given more than should be
required of them.
Our members never questioned what we had to do,
they were willing to do whatever it would take
to make it work. We are unsure if the Mayor is
aware of the incompetence of the Senior Manager
of Fleet and Support Services and the
Maintenance Manager at Transit Windsor. Both
have continually undermined the efforts that
have been organized to help with the efforts to
keep everyone safe. He should talk to the
corporation's Executive Director Pat Delmore,
the City CAO Onorio Colucci or City Engineer
Mark Winterton about how many times this Union
has expressed a great deal of concern with the
ineptitude of the maintenance management staff
at Transit Windsor. This Union has never
declined help. This Union Executive even on
their own accord cleaned and sanitized every
facility at Transit Windsor on their days off
and without pay. This was done without question
when management refused to step up and do their
jobs to protect all of the employees.
All of this has come down to cost. When other
governments are doing all they can to protect
the public and their employees this corporation
is only looking at ways to save money. The
Transit Windsor Corporation and now the Mayor
have continually used this pandemic as a cost
saving tool. It is unethical and completely
unacceptable to put the health and safety of the
community at risk for the almighty dollar. The
Mayor decided immediately to cut the service,
however when we mentioned back door exit and
entering for the driver and public safety he
said he was not ready to implement that at this
time, to which we had to force the issue and let
him know that if it was not done, we would not
have service on the road on Friday of last week
[March 20].
As to the Mayor's comments that the buses were
not cleaned up to his standards, we highly doubt
besides a couple political photo opportunities,
he has ever even stepped foot on a bus let
alone rode one. Our buses have never been
cleaner and have continually been sanitized over
and over again to protect everyone who comes in.
To the Mayor and the members of this Union, we
are continuing to be at work and continue to
support the community in its transit needs as
long as we possibly can. We will be anxiously
awaiting by our phones for the call to continue
the service needed to help those who require our
services to get to their employment in order to
help each and everyone through this crisis.
We apologize for the inconvenience to the
public and our supporters, but you have to
understand we were not part of the discussion to
stop transit. We were told at 2:30 pm yesterday
that the Mayor was going to announce at 3:00 pm
that he was going to terminate the service at
the end of the day Sunday for a 2-week period.
Our position is that this is a terrible mistake
that he has made, our position has not changed
that we want to be out there helping in any way
we can. At least the members of this Union and
the public deserve the truth from the Mayor as
to why this has transpired. Ben Hannaa from
Windsor Car Spotters stepped up to help provide
our members with masks.
(To access articles
individually click on the black headline.)
PDF
PREVIOUS ISSUES
| HOME
Website: www.cpcml.ca
Email: office@cpcml.ca
|
