Town, workers closer to strike after conciliation adjourns
Dawn Ostrem
Northern News Services
Iqaluit (Mar 26/01) - The Town and its workers are edging closer to a strike.
A conciliation process only lasted a day before the two sides left the table.
The Town's workers, members of the Nunavut Employees Union, have been without a collective agreement for about two years. Conciliation began March 21 and adjourned the next day.
Workers have voted 96 per cent for a strike to back up their contract demands and can legally walk off the job on April 11.
"We are very far apart," said NEU president Doug Workman, after the meetings broke off. "We hope the employer will treat our members with respect and give us a fair proposal."
The union wants pay retroactive to the expiration of its last collective agreement on July 1, 1999, pay increases and a new pay grid detailing salaries of specific positions.
Mayor John Matthews said the Town made an offer shortly before conciliation began, totalling nearly a half million dollars of increases but the union turned it down. The NEU did not specify what it wanted but Matthews said union demands totalled about $2.4 million with the opportunity to start new negotiations in three months.
"We are certainly preparing for a strike," said Matthews. "We are still looking at numbers but we just can not find any more money."
Workman said conciliation has not been called off, but workers are getting tired of the protracted talks.
"We have been negotiating this thing for about two years," he said.
In the event of a strike Iqaluit residents would have to prepare for a minimal amount of municipal services -- water and sewage only during regular working hours, one bylaw officer and no recreational facilities or garbage pick up. Emergency medical technicians would be on call, as would utility maintainers and mechanics.
Early last week Matthews did not say whether or not Toonik Tyme events, scheduled to end April 14, would be cancelled in the event of a strike.
