Unionized employees of Canada Post gather as a strike threat approaches.

Employees of Canada Post demonstrated in several sites nationwide. Thursday, as the Crown Corporation and its unionized workers face the possibility of going on strike. According to Bartlett, who has been employed by Canada Post for almost six years, postal workers will need to battle for job security. 

For almost a year, Canada Post and the Canadian Union of Postal Workers (CUPW) have been negotiating a contract. Those discussions go on. Workers overwhelmingly approved a strike last month if an agreement could not be reached at the negotiating table.

According to data provided by the union, 95.8% of urban workers and 95.5% of rural workers voted to back the strike mandate. Both the union and Canada Post have yet to give the required 72 hours’ notice before initiating a labor dispute.

Reasonable pay and secure working conditions

CUPW stated in a press release announcing the protests that it has been negotiating with Canada Post for “safe working conditions, fair wages, the right for all workers to retire with dignity, and the expansion of public postal services for all communities. “The press announcement stated, “Canada Post has not abandoned its proposed rollbacks during this process and is requesting that many of our significant issues be settled through arbitration.”

One of the main reasons Canada Post needs to reexamine its suggestions to the union is because of its worsening financial situation. Including $490 million in the first half of 2024, the Crown corporation has lost $3 billion since 2018.

Prof. claims that the core business is “dissolving.”

Canada Post’s fundamental products are “literally dissolving underneath [its] feet,” according to Ian Lee, a professor of commerce at Carleton University. According to Lee, who has written a lot about Canada Post, there isn’t enough revenue to sustain the mail carriers’ existing workload. According to Canada Post’s most recent annual report, if it doesn’t take on more borrowing and refinancing, it will fall below its operating and reserve cash requirements by early 2025.

Revenue is already being impacted by the strike threat.

Customers who are worried about their vacation packages not arriving on time are switching delivery services, according to Canada Post, which claims that the threat of a strike is “rapidly impacting” its income. To prevent goods from becoming stranded in the mail system during a strike, customers have also canceled direct marketing initiatives. 

According to the statement, mail and parcel volumes are “down significantly and continue to erode,” and the company’s already precarious financial situation would only worsen as a result of the strike threat. For almost a year, Canada Post and its unionized workers have been negotiating a new contract. Ninety-five percent of employees supported a strike last month.

Delivery on the weekends is a problem.

Including $490 million in the first half of 2024, Canada Post has lost $3 billion since 2018. To compete with other parcel delivery services, the Crown corporation has stated that it must increase parcel delivery on weekends and evenings. The demand for weekend delivery was cited as a topic of contention by the union and the firm. According to the union, it wants to ensure that regular full-time weekday routes are not jeopardized by the changes Canada Post is pursuing.

Federal Labor Minister Steven MacKinnon says federal mediators, who were hired in mid-October, are still trying to prevent a strike.

There is no strike notice and union negotiations continue.

Canada Post reports that negotiations with the postal workers’ union went on Sunday and neither party has issued a notice of a work stoppage. Despite not issuing a strike notice, the Canadian Union of Postal Workers might have been in a lawful striking position when a cooling-off period in the contract negotiations concluded the day before.

According to a brief statement from the Crown corporation, both parties have agreed not to provide the mandatory 72-hour notice of a strike or lockout. Operations are going on as usual, it said.