One day after Labour Minister Lisa Raitt threatened to legislate flight attendants back to work if they walked off the job, a tentative deal has been struck between their union and Air Canada.
The Canadian Union of Public Employees, representing 6,800 flight attendants, made the announcement Tuesday afternoon. Details of the contract won't be made public until the union ratifies the tentative agreement.
"It's business as usual and customers can continue to make their travel plans on Air Canada with confidence," Susan Welscheid, Air Canada's senior vice-president of customer service said in a statement.
The announcement comes after talks broke down late Monday night.
Union president Jeff Taylor said "the union's executive committee will recommend that its members accept this tentative agreement."
In August, Air Canada flight attendants overwhelmingly rejected a tentative deal between CUPE and the airline.
The major areas of dispute have been wages, pensions, crew rest and working conditions.
The union has to submit the contract to its members nationwide and meetings will be held in Vancouver, Calgary, Toronto and Montreal. The voting process will take at least one week, giving travellers a little time to breathe.
"The best agreement is always the one that the two parties can reach themselves so I strongly encourage the parties to continue to work together so the union can ensure ratification by the membership," Raitt said in the House of Commons shortly after the announcement.
"This is an agreement that is good for both the employees and the employers and as a result is good for Canada and all Canadians. The objective of the legislation that we put on notice yesterday has been achieved."
CUPE national president Paul Moist said they are confident their membership will agree to the deal.
However, he said the government's threat of back-to-work legislation actually hurt negotiations, as they were close to a deal beforehand.
"This settlement happened in spite of intervention by the government of Canada," he told CTV's Power Play.
"The minister of labour has become the minister of employers in our point of view."
Raitt suggested her legislative threat may have helped expedite the deal.
"For every action, there's a reaction," she said on CTV's Power Play Tuesday.
The union was in a legal position to strike Wednesday morning at 12:01 a.m.
The union has lifted the order to strike and has asked its members to respect their shifts and duties.
Raitt said she started preparing legislation that would force the flight attendants back to work if the two sides can't come up with an agreement that is ratified by the union members, and they walk off the job.
"The reality is we understand from the company that the disruptions on day one would result in 65,000 Canadians in a place that is not their home, quite frankly. They'll be at the other side of their journey and we want to make sure we minimize the disruptions to the travelling public as much as we can," she said.
Earlier this year, Raitt made a similar threat against Air Canada after customer service employees walked out. The move motivated unionized workers and employer to reach a deal and avoid government intervention. The Conservatives also legislated striking Canada Post workers back to the job in June.
Raitt defended her government's use of the back-to-work threat.
"The vast majority of cases, 98 per cent of the time, we don't get simply involved," she said. "It's a case-by-case basis."
