REGINA — On October 4 nearly 5,000 workers at SaskTel, SaskEnergy, SaskPower, SaskWater, DirectWest, SecurTek, and the province’s Water Security Agency went on strike. All of the employees are represented by Unifor.
Some of those Crown employees had returned to work earlier this week and SaskTel workers were about to as well, but the company told them to stay off the job.
After announcing a return to work “SaskTel workers have now been locked out by the employer, triggering a cancellation of the planned return to work at other Crown corporations,” reads a Unifor press release.
However, the union reportedly planned to send employees back to work but still maintain the right to periodic walkouts, which SaskTel says made it impossible to ensure quality of service for its customers.
This has led the other provincial workers to stay off the job. “We’re going to stay on the picket line in solidarity with SaskTel and to ensure that our own membership is not divided by the employer,” said Ian Davidson, Unifor Local 649 president representing workers at SaskEnergy and SaskPower. “Crown workers and our families are united as ever in the campaign for a fair contract, and that doesn’t change today because the government has dropped the ball again.”
As for the company, it said in a statement it “will not be allowing employees who are members of Unifor to return to work in the absence of a concluded collective agreement. SaskTel did not make this decision lightly, but management cannot provide the desired level of customer service or maintain the integrity of our networks for the people of Saskatchewan with unknown and intermittent walkouts.”
Unifor had told members “returning to work on October 8, 2019, is a short-term measure and that they will only provide 24 hours’ notice before going on strike again,” reads the SaskTel statement. “It takes the corporation up to 48 hours to mobilize the business back and forth to have the necessary processes, systems and accesses reinstated. This creates far too much uncertainty and the corporation needs to ensure we are able to maintain the integrity of our networks and serve our customers in a safe and secure manner.
“SaskTel has found situations of configuration issues that occurred during the work to rule strike action last week that may have impacted our ability to televise live events, such as football games, and other live Pay-Per-View (PPV) events. It also appears there were fictitious orders created that may have potentially disrupted service to our customers.”
The provincial telco “is also considering applying for an injunction to stop Unifor’s illegal labour disruption activities, such as preventing non-union employees from reporting to work at the SaskTel Contact Centres,” adds the company.
Contract negotiations between Unifor and SaskTel have been ongoing since January.
While the lockout/strike is happening, the company has warned customers they may experience delays in service, SaskTel stores will be closed during a labour disruption and the company will be unable to activate new home services or transfer services when moving.
