VANCOUVER – Striking workers at Agricore, Canada’s second largest grain handler, set up picket lines outside two Vancouver grain terminals on Friday in a move that could disrupt export shipments.
Members of the Grain Services Union established pickets at the Pacific and Cascadia Terminals and unionized longshore workers and grain testers were refusing to cross the picket line, a GSU spokesman said.
The GSU vowed to increase pressure in its demands for a new contract after the company on Monday rejected the union’s offer to return to work and submit outstanding issues to binding arbitration.
The two sides are at odds over issues including employee classification, hours of work, seniority and pensions.
Some 350 of the GSU’s 800 members are in the second week of their strike in the province of Manitoba and rotating strikes have taken place at elevators in Alberta.
Vancouver is Canada’s largest grain export port with five major terminals. Grain traffic was also tied up in March by a series of rotating strikes by unionized grain weighers who wereeventually ordered back to work by Parliament.
