Fight to save GO train contract continues

Representatives from CAW Local 103 were once told by former Premier and MPP for Nipissing Mike Harris to stop fighting the ONTC divestiture plan as the deal was done. National CAW Representative Brian Stevens, who was the Local 103 president at the time, says ONTC employees didn’t roll and play dead then and they are not about to start now.

Today Stevens, Ontario Northland union members joined with North Bay Mayor Al McDonald, chamber of commerce members and city staff to meet with Nipissing MPP Monique Smith to talk strategies to save the $120 million GO Transit refurbishment contract that Ontario Northland lost out on last week to Quebec’s Canadian Allied Diesel (CAD).

Stevens says it was a good meeting allowing union reps to express their frustrations as well as formulate their plan to get the decision overturned.



MPP Smith told the group that the decision has been made and she will continue to search for new work for the ONTC.

Stevens says he accepts Smith’s position and encourages her to find more work for the shop, however, in no way does that stop the union from appealing the decision.

“But our position is on this decision is that this is a political decision that is going to require the focus of all three political parties,” he explains.

“This isn’t a decision we want to come October (for) someone to say well if we had been the government don’t worry we’d have done something different.”

“Step up to the plate, as I have said before, reach down grab your socks and pull them up and get to work. And we are saying that to all three political parties. This should not rest solely on the shoulders of the premier or the Liberal party this is about a decision that is in the best interest of Ontarians and Northern Ontarians in particular. And all three parties should have that as their main objective.”

“Simply when you look at the math I accept a business perspective CAD came in $2 million dollars (under), but when you take in the overall benefit of the province of Ontario that cannot be ignored and that be lost on either of those parties and it’s our intentions to raise that with all three parties,” he adds.

Mayor McDonald says while MPP Smith continues to look for new opportunities he will work with the unions and community leaders to have the decision overturned.

He says the award is flawed because important provincial revenues figures (HST, Employer Health Tax and the Health Premium) were not factored in. He says the province would actually save $6 million if the contract were awared to the ONTC.



The CAW Local Union and National Union will be outlining
their fightback plans during a media conference on Wednesday afternoon.