Air Canada pilots arrive for an information picket at Vancouver International Airport in Richmond, B.C., on Aug. 27.DARRYL DYCK/The Canadian Press
Steven Tufts is a labour geographer in the faculty of environmental and urban change at York University.
In 2012, the Stephen Harper government pre-empted a labour dispute and legislated Air Canada’s pilots and ground crew to stay on the job before any strike began. Air Canada AC-T clearly had such government intervention in mind in its bargaining with the Air Line Pilots Association.
Air Canada cancelled flights well before any strike could even begin – ostensibly to prevent chaos and uncertainty in the event of a strike, but the move itself created chaos and uncertainty.
The company communicated directly with the federal government asking them to intervene in negotiations. Additional pressure was put on the government by allied business groups pleading for the parties to be sent to binding arbitration. Air Canada also released its offer of a 30-per-cent wage increase (still below what U.S. pilots achieved in their most recent negotiations), hoping public sentiment will turn against the union.
The company hoped the government would value passenger convenience and the need to prevent disruption to the economy over the right to strike. You can’t really blame Air Canada for betting on this strategy as the government used Section 107 of the Canada Labour Code to end strikes in rail and air over the past year.
But successful strategies work … until they don’t. No government intervention came in the airline dispute. And on Friday Prime Minister Justin Trudeau explicitly ruled it out.
It’s therefore unsurprising that the airline reached a tentative agreement with the union on Sunday. The Globe and Mail reported that the deal granted raises of almost 42 per cent over four years. Air Canada executives are going to have to live with the fact that pilots are going to cost more.
Air Canada’s strategy miscalculated government willingness to refer negotiations to arbitration to avoid a strike. It failed to incorporate the instability of minority governments and the pro-worker turn of federal Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre, head of a party that has traditionally stood on the side of companies.
While the Liberal government has used Section 107 over the past few months to end disputes, they now risk political suicide if they do so again.
The Liberals no longer have a confidence-and-supply agreement with the NDP. And it’s telling how that got dissolved. New Democrat Leader Jagmeet Singh ended the relationship, in part, as a response to the government’s recent intervention in labour disputes. Positioning yourself as the party of labour is difficult when you stand by as workers lose their right to strike.
And Section 107 is the easy route. If the Liberals wanted to copy Mr. Harper and use legislation, they likely would not have the support. Only the Conservative Party could even remotely consider voting for such legislation, and Air Canada has been blindsided by Mr. Poilievre and the federal Conservatives seeking an election.
Mr. Poilievre has broken with previous Conservative positions and stated he was siding with the pilots’ right to negotiate a “fair deal.” Mr. Poilievre’s statement surprised many and ruffled Mr. Singh’s feathers as he ate the NDP’s lunch.
All of this undermined Air Canada’s strategy of government intervention to avoid a strike. This time around, the government had no reason to act as quickly as it had in other disputes.
We had a scenario where if the Liberals pre-emptively used section 107 to send the dispute to arbitration, they would be cast as anti-worker by other parties. In the current political environment, with everyone courting the union vote, such a label is especially dangerous for a minority government.
If the Liberals tabled back-to-work legislation in the House and it failed, it would be a glaring sign of weakness – and in the game of politics that’s the beginning of the end. A minority government getting defeated on key legislation could possibly pave the path for a confidence vote and force the Liberals into an election that Mr. Poilievre so badly wants.
Air Canada miscalculated how much support it has for government intervention before a strike occurs. And the airline may struggle to find a lot of sympathy for the position it’s in. The company is not always popular with Canadians – and politicians know it.