Unionized STM workers protest, call for contract negotiations to advance

Hundreds of unionized STM employees took to the streets Wednesday to demonstrate outside of the Montreal’s public transit company’s administrative offices at Place Bonaventure.

Several unions affiliated with the FTQ, in particular, but also one from the CSN, representing 4,600 employees including bus drivers and metro operators, professionals, maintenance employees, office workers, and constables, were on hand.

They are asking the STM to soften its position in order for agreements to be reached.

“We’ve had 20 meetings about 60 proposals from both sides and the STM is still making major and unjustified demands that would undermine the STM’s ability to continue fulfilling its mission in the long term,” said Benoit Tessier, Vice-President of the Union of STM professionals who was onsite for the protest.

Representatives of the various unions on site reported that the STM’s salary offers are 11.5 per cent over five years. However, the use of subcontracting is also a key issue in these negotiations. The unions say they want to keep expertise in-house—for IT, engineering, and even for drivers.

“What we say to the STM today is enough with private consulting firms your professionals are on the street today to say it clearly: we want to continue working at the STM and we want a collective agreement based around that. So make steps towards that in this negotiation, trust your professionals,” said Tessier.

“Management must negotiate with a genuine desire to reach a settlement that is beneficial to the STM, its professionals, and users,” said Marc Glogowski, president of SEPB-610, in a press release.

“We have proposed several innovative solutions for which we are still waiting for feedback. Instead, we are being asked for unacceptable setbacks that will unnecessarily increase the STM’s operating costs. What we want is for Montrealers to be able to continue to count on strong expertise that works for the good of public transit and users,” he added.

The STM, facing significant financial challenges, says it needs flexibility. It has already launched a process to privatize paratransit, for example.

“With the STM, it’s the slogan ‘move backward,'” exclaimed Frédéric Therrien, president of the Union of Bus Drivers and Metro Operators, in an interview. This union is the largest union—a local of the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE), affiliated with the FTQ.

This union has a strike mandate, which it has not yet exercised. But Therrien assures that if it comes to that, his members will. For now, negotiation meetings are continuing, he said.

In a statement to CityNews, the STM says discussions with the two unions demonstrating are progressing well, with several more meetings scheduled to take place by the end of October.

A spokesperson for the public transit agency says: “We are actively continuing our discussions at the bargaining table to agree on working conditions that will both motivate our employees and respect the STM’s financial capacity. This collective agreement negotiation is taking place in a unique context where the STM is experiencing a period of major change and must be cost-effective.”

The unions have been without a collective agreement since January of this year.

-With files from The Canadian Press