St. Lawrence Seaway strike leaving goods, ships stranded at Port of Thunder Bay

The St. Lawrence Seaway shutdown has left ships unable to pass through the port of Thunder Bay on Lake Superior in northwestern Ontario.

Hundreds of workers stationed between Lake Erie and Montreal walked off the job Sunday after they were unable to reach an agreement with the employer by the strike deadline, said the union. 

While seaway locks are closed, ships won't be able to load up in Thunder Bay or drop off loads to be transported west. This could cause shipments to slow down or stop entirely if the strike continues for more than a couple days, said Chris Heikkinen, the Port of Thunder Bay's chief executive officer. 

"It's the busy time of the season for shipping grain as well as potash and other Western Canadian commodities," he said, "so every day that the strike continues has an impact here in Thunder Bay." 

Operations at the port are continuing for now, said Heikkinen, as workers continue to offload shipments such as grain onto trains. While the port has some storage capacity, Heikkinen said it will eventually hit its limit. It's also possible that a prolonged shutdown could impact business if shippers decide to switch to other routes to avoid the port. 

"We are very hopeful that the parties in the negotiations come to an agreement so we don't reach that that sort of tipping point," he said. 

Some ships are currently sitting in the port, waiting for the strike to be resolved. 

Union asks employer to reconsider

The St. Lawrence Seaway is a marine shipping route that links the Atlantic Ocean to the Great Lakes through a system of 15 locks between Lake Erie and Montreal.

The seaway is co-managed by the St. Lawrence Seaway Management Corp. (SLSMC), a non-profit established by the Canadian government, and the Great Lakes St. Lawrence Seaway Development Corp., a U.S. federal agency.

When combined with the Soo Locks at Sault Ste. Marie, Ont. — managed separately by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers — the transit system stretches about 3,700 kilometres from Lake Superior to the Atlantic.

In a release shortly after midnight on Sunday, the union said it was unable to reach an agreement with the employer by the strike deadline, despite negotiations "right up to the last moment."

"We cannot allow workers' rights to be compromised. We remain open to discussion and hope that the employer will reconsider its position for the good of all," Daniel Cloutier, Unifor's Quebec director, said in a release.

The union said this week that it remained "1,000 nautical miles apart" from management on wages — the key wedge in discussions — and it was up to the employer to avoid any transit disruption.

"These are jobs that require intense training, a high level of understanding of the health and safety risks, and that carry enormous responsibility for the well-being of seafarers and their cargo. They are irreplaceable," Cloutier said in an earlier release.

In its own statement released after midnight, the SLSMC said the parties are at an impasse as Unifor "continues to insist on wage increases inspired by automotive-type negotiations," and the seaway will remain shut down until an agreement can be reached.

Striking workers have 'lot of leverage': labour studies prof

While there have been significant recent wage gains by unions representing auto industry workers, there's likely more to why seaway workers are choosing to strike now, said Larry Savage, a labour studies professor at Brock University in St. Catharines, Ont. 

Two of the five local bargaining units currently on strike had reached tentative agreements earlier this summer, said Savage, "but they simply weren't good enough."

The workers at the seaway seized a window of opportunity where they "have a lot of leverage," by shutting down this crucial transportation corridor during a busy time of year, he said.

Savage said there has been pressure from the business community to push the federal government to end the labour dispute, but the federal government may resist calls to pass back-to-work legislation, as it did earlier this summer during the B.C. port strike.

This strike is also part of a wave of workers with increasingly bold bargaining demands across all sectors in North America. 

But Savage said bold doesn't necessarily mean unreasonable, as many unions set their sights on helping workers catch up to where they were before inflation spiked. 

"After the pandemic, people have a new sense of the value of their own labour and they are really looking toward their unions to improve their lot in life and to help address this cost of living crisis that all workers are facing."