CN strike and back to work legislation

[_social_retard_]

I don't think any of you need a link to this. I've been thinknig about this for a whiel now. It doesn't sit right with me. On the one hand yuo have a group of worker who feel they are being underpaid for thier very important services who are legaly striking wichis one of the few actions an emploee can take to get action on his or her greivances,

Comments

[_social_retard_]

Thats probably not a half bad idea but somehow I think people would still be complaining. They have managers filling in for the workers on strike and a lot of workers went back to work once they heard what a mess it was making for people so there was still soem service. Its just that people don't want reduced service, they want buisness as usal. Would the government have intervened if only half the workers walked off? I don't know, Im liable to say that this government would have. Here in Ottawa we recently had our pupblic transit renegotiate thier contract. There was talk of a strike but the union wanted to keep the public on thier side so they came up with some reative ways of sticking it to the man while still getting people to work on time. They showed up to work out of uniform and I know some of them were not charging fare to ride. Thats pretty nifty in my opinion but you can't allways do stuff like that and it's hard to say how much something like working in your casual clothes affect an employer. Personaly I think CN shuold have sucked it up and made a decent offer to bring them back to work instead of running off to the courts to try and get the strike ruled as illigal and then running off to the government to get special permision to send them back to work once that didn't work.

[_social_retard_]

Well the gas prices went up because there was a major fire in the Impiral oil refinery in Ontario, they still arnt back up to full production. But your right this did have a major impact on Canadian industry, though i think they have gone back to work before anything with any lasting effect has happened. But thats the waya strike works. Workers leave, the employer's clients get pissed and put pressuer on the employer and the employer makes an offer to bring the workers back while negotiations continue. At least thats the way its supposed to work. This deal is only tenative by the way, it still has to be raified.

[_social_retard_]

Striking is an extreem measure but unions erally do help, even if they don't ever strike. Im unionized myself and never really thought much about it. Ive only had a couple other jobs before and they were for big companies so I was treated pertty well (not that I knew it at the time). Now im seeing all the crap my roommate is going through working for little places and I realise that ive got it pretty sweet with my union. See my roommate has worked in a lot of little canteens or cafererias. It seems to be pretty common place that those employeers, pay minimum wage with no benifits, don't pay overtime, make thier workers work shitty shifts and the like. And if you complain? you get the boot. Hes bee fired without just cause more than a couple times. One he was fired for asking about workman's comp when he got injured on the job. Hes complains to labor bored and better buinsess buros and all that jazz but nothing ever comes of it because those guys are so swamped. See working for a big corp has it's perks. Big corps want to make the big bucks so they hire decent management that knows how to handle itself and such, they also know that if they don't play by the rules they can screw themselves over. If Mcdonald's didn't pay thier employees the proper overtime how long do you think it would take before it was in the media? It would be a PR nightmare. But what about that company that makes the meals at college X? Well they can get away with a lot more because they arnt in the public eye. But if those workers were unionized they would have thier own personal group of people making suer the employer styed in line and followed the law. That was longer than i meant it to be but you get the idea.

[allhatnocattle]

Funny, the price of gas went up twice in 24hrs here in Calgary. I was wondering why with a taxi driver yesterday morning. An oil finery fire in Ontario wold explian it, sort of. I was thinking it was Sunoco announcing it costs $40/barrel to break even in the oil sands.

[_social_retard_]

Personaly I think they bump up the price of gas at every excuse they get.

[_social_retard_]

Yes im glad they didn't strike. Though i foudn out something interesting at the time. My boss told me that if they did striek I wouldh ave to find my own way to work (wich kinda freaked me out because I live at the other end of the city) but then later I foudn out from my union that in the event of a transit strike my employer has to provide transport. More liekly than not my supervisor was jsut not aware of all the rules in the contract.
But yeah, pont is there are other tools and it pays to use them. Don't use a hammer when you need a screwdriver.

[_social_retard_]

Those are the sorts of little perks you get when you have a union. Also it's in the company's best interests to help thier employees get to work that way they keep thier clients happy.

[_social_retard_]

Why do yuo find it scarey?
My job involves me being part of a union and besies paying a coulpe bucks a month for dues i'e never had anythign to complain about because of it. Sure sometimes I wish they were a little more active but its nothing to complain about. I get above minimum wage, I get benifits, I get a few perks like if im in for less than 4 hours I get paid for a full 4 hours and stuff like that.