Negotiations between Canada Post, union still on hold

The union representing 55,000 striking postal workers says a new framework for negotiations from Canada Post is far from what its members could ratify.

In a statement issued Monday night, the Canadian Union of Postal Workers (CUPW) says the framework moves closer to its positions on some issues, including the defined benefit pension. Still, it says there is no movement on benefits or fixes for the union’s health and safety concerns.

“We are now in the third week of our nationwide strike. The Union is prepared to return to the bargaining table. We’re waiting to be called back by the mediators,” read the statement from CUPW.

Canada Post hoped the document would reignite discussions with the union in the dispute that has halted mail delivery during the busy holiday season. 

In an interview with CityNews on Monday, the Crown corporation’s Vice President of Strategic Communications, John Hamilton, emphasized the need for a more flexible delivery model for Canada Post to remain competitive and grow its parcel business. This includes a push to expand parcel delivery into the weekend.

“Canadians not only want seven-day week delivery, they don’t want to pay for delivery,” Hamilton explained. “So the more competitive we can make that rate, the more we’d have a chance to grow our parcel business.”

“We can’t lock into a three or four-year agreement maintaining our current mail-based delivery model that doesn’t allow for weekend delivery at an affordable rate,” he added. “We’ve seen what’s happened to our parcel market share the last two years because of the increase in competition coming out of the pandemic.”

Hamilton says there is a backlog of parcels that have not moved in three weeks but that nothing is coming into the postal system. He estimates that the corporation has lost out on 19 million parcels that have gone to competitors since the national strike began.

When asked why the corporation decided to lay off strike workers last week, Hamilton said, “We’ve got zero revenue coming in, zero parcels coming in, zero mail coming in. So we needed to take steps to protect the long-term future of the company.”

Meanwhile, the U.S. Postal Service has temporarily stopped accepting mail headed to Canada due to the strike by Canada Post workers and is asking customers to refrain from mailing items addressed to Canada until further notice. 

With files from The Canadian Press and CityNews‘ Denio Lourenco.