Marathon Vancouver airport hotel strike ends after 1,411 days

The union representing workers at the Radisson Blu Vancouver Airport Hotel says staff have ratified a new collective agreement, ending a nearly four-year-long strike.

Unite Here Local 40 says the 1,411-day strike was the longest in Canadian history and the agreement provides a pathway back to work for 143 workers terminated during the COVID-19 pandemic, when the hotel was called Pacific Gateway.

The union says in a statement the deal also provides job security protections and higher wages.

Local president Zailda Chan says in the statement that 70 per cent of the hotel's workers were let go during the pandemic, when the hotel was used as a quarantine site.

But instead of giving up, Chan says co-workers walked off the job, demanding their colleagues be reinstated.

"They were family to them. They were best friends and they couldn't stomach that level of injustice," she told CBC News.

The strike surpasses the Vale Inco mine strike in Ontario that lasted almost two years and ended in July 2010.

"I remember when we first walked out, I had a six-month-old son. And now he's four and a half," Chan said, reflecting on the duration of the labour dispute. "The workers have shown that if you fight and if you don't give up, that you will win."

Sussanne Skidmore, president of the B.C. Federation of Labour, says the strike's length was highly unusual for Canada.

She noted that the uncertainty of the hospitality industry during the pandemic contributed to the prolonged fight.

"The workers were very brave to stay out on the line this long during very difficult times through all the different seasons."

Quarantine hotel

In May 2021, the union says the 400-room hotel in Richmond, B.C., was "fully booked" by the federal government as a quarantine site for international travellers.

Unite Here says in a joint statement with Radisson Blu that the collective agreement gives terminated workers the right to return based on seniority, with the recall period extending for 36 months, and workers will now earn the highest wages in the Vancouver airport and Richmond hotel market.

The statement says the contract includes improved medical benefits, with lower eligibility requirements, as well as industry-leading cleaning standards.

Jillian Louie, a longtime server and striker, says she was among those let go and has been waiting for years to return.

"I was devastated," she told CBC News. "I was lost for words because I didn't know what to do next," she said.

Louie, who started at the hotel in 1991, says she took on part-time work to get by over the past four years but is eager to return to her old job.

"I haven't really worked with these people for a long time, and I'm actually very excited," she said.