Daniel MacIsaac
Northern News Services

NNSL (Mar 24/99) - Frustrated and fearing they won't be back to work anytime soon, striking technicians shut down the CBC's Forrest Drive building in Yellowknife on Saturday.

When Dave Bondy, on-air host of the Bush Radio morning program showed up for work Saturday, he was told politely but firmly by picketers that they were not allowing anyone to enter the building. Bush Radio failed to air as a result and normal programming resumed only on the next day.

Darrel Eros, secretary-treasurer for the Communications, Energy and Paperworkers union Local 85, said Monday that managers were also barred from entering the office Saturday.

"It was a way of saying, `There'll be no programming today,'" he said. "To effectively limit or shut down programming is the only way we can hurt the CBC."

Yellowknife's 16 striking technicians and their 1,400 colleagues nationwide found themselves in dire straights Friday when CBC administrators and producers -- represented by the Canadian Media Guild -- struck tentative deals with management, just hours before the production unit had threatened to join the technicians on picket lines across the country.

And while, in an act of solidarity, the Guild declared Monday that its members would not ratify the contracts until the technicians' strike ends, the settlements have left strikers isolated. CEP talks broke off Friday when its bargaining team rejected management's latest proposal.

"This new offer was an insult," announced CEP spokesman Mike Sullivan on Monday, citing wages as the major stumbling block.

"We have been on strike for nearly five weeks, and CBC negotiators haven't even begun to address the real issues we put before them."

Eros said that while the action in Yellowknife was not a direct action of Friday's developments, "everything is inter-related."

While picketing etiquette means that management should escort non-striking workers across the line, Saturday's action was unusual because the technicians hadn't previously picketed on a weekend and because they also barred management from entering the building.

"We could do that everyday but whether it would be effective is another story -- because management would just call the police," said Eros. "It's better to strike like a thief in the night."

Local 85 president Anne Lynagh warned last Thursday that if the strike continued, more programming disruptions would occur -- though she said the strikers would take into account that Northeners have fewer broadcasting alternatives than the rest of Canada.

"Our battle's not with the public, it's with management," Lynagh said.

CBC North management was unavailable for comment Monday.