with air canada pilots poised to strike, the ndp has abrogated its supply and confidence agreement with the liberals and announced that it will not support back-to-work legislation. with the conservatives making a play for organized labour and anxious to trigger an election, it is unclear how far they will go this time, assuming prime minister justin trudeau, fearful of the political winds and increasingly desperate to avoid the electorate, decides to have the minister of labour order them back to work as they did with the railway workers.
the potential pilots’ strike comes weeks after a labour dispute briefly put our two major rail networks out of commission.
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it’s not as if air canada pilots are doing poorly. they are already close to or in the top one per cent of canadians, with air canada captains earning between $215,075 and $351,958 in 2023, depending on the type of aircraft, for usually about 12.5 days worked per month. in addition to those wages, they have comprehensive benefits including the increasingly rare defined benefit pension plans and travel packages continuing after retirement. not many canadians have it that good and, for some perspective, they earn dramatically more than the average member of my profession while working considerably fewer hours.
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but with trudeau fearing an election call, order the pilots back to work and imposing binding arbitration to determine appropriate wages might not happen, a casualty of the latest shenanigans on parliament hill . and canadians will be worse off.