CBTU Calls for Guardrails to Protect the Right to Job Action

As Canada looks to build and grow, protect our sovereignty, and create good-paying, unionized jobs, Canada’s Building Trades Unions (CBTU) believes we need certainty and predictability to attract investment, get major projects moving, and put tradespeople to work.

That certainty must include strong collective bargaining and protect workers’ rights.

With the federal government’s new legislation affecting the Canada Labour Code and the right to strike, CBTU is calling for clear protections of our members’ right to take lawful job action, when necessary, if bargaining reaches an impasse.

As outlined in our recent submission to the federal government on potential changes to the Canada Labour Code, we supported the use of mediation as part of a call to ensure that any government intervention in legal job action be restricted to cases where continuation of a job action would cause significant harm to public health, safety, or security, and truly exceptional circumstances with no reasonably foreseeable resolution.

“When our members invoke job action, they are not doing so lightly,” shared CBTU’s Executive Director, Sean W. Strickland. Strickland continued. “We need certainty for investment, and we need projects moving, but we cannot achieve that by taking away the very tool workers have to protect their livelihoods and their safety. The right to strike must remain protected, with strong guardrails around any government intervention.”

CBTU is committed to a Canada where investor have the confidence to build, major projects move forward, and skilled trades workers are protected. We can deliver certainty without sacrificing workers’ rights.