Michael Gravelle says the indications are there that the ONTC and its workers have a bright future.
The Minister of Northern Development and Mines was in North Bay on Thursday for a funding announcement at Canadore College.
Gravelle was reacting to the news that more than 30 jobs are being offered during a Job Fair on Wednesday, February 17th at the ONR Remanufacturing and Repair Centre.
That good labour news comes on the heels of recent contract settlements including a settlement back in December which ended the lockout of 350 ONTC employees working in clerical, on-board service, stores, shops and Cochrane Station Inn at various locations across Northern Ontario.
“We believe that we could build a sustainable, long term, viable, and economical relationship with the ONTC and I think that the success of that is now is fairly evident,” stated Gravelle.
“We were able to reach a very difficult but the very successful labour negotiations settlements with four of the five unions and now we can look forward to building an efficient and vital organization and that's good news.”
Union officials hope that part of this sense of optimism will include more support from the province in helping the ONTC secure more long term and sustainable contracts.
“We are very supportive of the efforts that are under way and the evidence is out there now in terms of, new jobs are available at the re-furbishing shop, and I have been and continue to be supportive of the organization of the ONTC,” he said.
“I'm very impressed of the work that our CEO and the senior management team have done, and I’m impressed the work that they did, and they'll continue to build this.
"Our goal as a government because I'm the minister who is responsible of this is I'm going down to Queen’s Park to make the case that the public lives that are being kept under our management are under control and its going to be successful and they need to be efficient, valuable, and economically sustainable and we believe that they will be and the ONTC does too, and part of that is going to enable them to move forward with the efforts that they're doing now.
"I'm strongly supportive and pleased to have a opportunity to go over to the commission offices and congratulate them, thank them, and re commit to working closely with them as we move forward."
