Maritime
Employers’ Association v. Syndicat Des Debardeurs Canadian Industrial Relations Board
Michele Pineau, Vice-Chairperson
July 23, 1999 (15 pages)
In the most recent round of negotiations at the Port of Montreal,
the Union representing longshoremen and the Employers’
Association tabled their initial positions in January 1998, and
there was steady progress in negotiations until June. On June 12,
the Union tabled what the Employer believed was its final set of
demands. Soon thereafter, the Union took the position that talks
were stalled. An illegal strike, which apparently resulted from
the failure to reach an agreement, followed in July, and the Board
issued a back to work order late that month.
A conciliator was appointed in September and,
at a conciliation meeting, the Union tabled additional demands. At
a subsequent conciliation meeting in November, the Union tabled a
further document, which it argued was a clarification of its
previous position. The Employer believed this document contained
twenty entirely new proposals. In its view, the Union had now
proposed 130 new items since unveiling its supposedly final set of
demands on June 12. The Employer refused to attend further
conciliation meetings and filed a complaint of bad faith
bargaining against the Union.
The Board found that the Union had, indeed,
failed to bargain in good faith. The central factor in this
determination was the Union's constantly shifting set of demands.
The Union asserted that it was free to change
its position as it acquired new information or, as happened in
this case, when union leadership changed. The Board did not accept
this argument. In its view, some stability was necessary for
negotiations to move forward.
"Reasonable effort implies a desire to
move forward, even by small steps, to a resolution, without
necessarily winning on every front. However, it is difficult to
make progress, to plan responses or to do any homework when the
demands are vague or ever-changing….Once bargaining has
started, the playing field needs to remain stable and conducive
to an agreement".
The Union also argued that the numerous
documents it tabled during negotiations did not represent changing
demands, but clarification of demands which had been advanced
early on in the bargaining process. The Board carefully reviewed
the documents and rejected this argument.
In the result, the Board ordered that the
parties return to conciliation. The Union, however, was ordered to
proceed on the basis of the demands it tabled on June 12, and to
refrain from making "clarifications" that resulted in
improvements to clauses, statements, or principles set out in the
June 12 document.
