Transit workers go on strike in Metro Vancouver

UPDATE — Jan. 8, 2024: Commuters brace for impact of transit workers' strike in Metro Vancouver

Metro Vancouver transit workers represented by CUPE Local 4500 have begun job action on Saturday.

More than 180 transit supervisors overseeing everything from engineering to maintenance within the Metro Vancouver transit system have started refusing overtime as of 8 a.m. Saturday.

The union says the job action, which followed a 72-hour strike notice on Wednesday, comes as a last resort as talks with their employer, the Coast Mountain Bus Company (CMBC), broke down. The last collective agreement expired in October 2022.

CMBC is a subsidiary of TransLink, the transit authority for Metro Vancouver.

Chris Gindhu, president of Local 4500, says some of the issues that led to the job action were fair wages and excessive workloads.

"We have proposals on the table to increase staffing levels ... and the company has so far refused to consider our solutions," he told CBC News.

Union representative Liam O'Neill previously told CBC News some of their members were "working more overtime than they work straight hours."

Gindhu says transit riders would "definitely notice" service levels drop as a result of the overtime ban, and predicted buses would run late as a result.

"Some buses won't make it into service on time [in] the depots," he said. "Some routes may be affected if the buses are not able to even leave the garage."

The union president says talks with the employer involved the efforts of veteran labour mediator, Vince Ready, but negotiations broke down. He says the union is prepared to further escalate job action if necessary.

"TransLink and Coast Mountain Bus Company plan for major expansion in the coming years, where they'll need us even more," he said. "There's a vision [to] double service in the next 10 years. And we haven't even increased staffing levels since 2012.

"Our question to them is how? How are they going to go about that?"

In a statement, Coast Mountain Bus Company president Michael McDaniel urged striking workers to return to the bargaining table with "realistic expectations."

"CMBC has made CUPE 4500 the same wage offer already agreed to by all other CMBC employees," he wrote.

"We will be closely monitoring the ongoing job action, but do not expect the union's overtime ban to have significant impacts to the delivery of transit services."

Gindhu, however, says wage equality with other TransLink employees was the issue, not the general wage increase.

The company employs almost 6,000 people in total, mostly bus drivers, according to the TransLink website.

The strike by transit workers comes on the heels of a historic year for labour action in B.C. and Canada.

Transit workers in the Comox Valley went on strike in December, following a four-month drivers' strike in the Fraser Valley over the summer.