A union leader fears violence after a Caterpillar subsidiary erected a fence Wednesday around London’s Electro-Motive plant and workers scrambled to hold a strike vote.

Tim Carrie, president of the Canadian Auto Workers unit representing more than 500 workers at the plant, said a lockout or strike by week’s end is inevitable and he fears tensions will erupt.

“This is going to be mean and dirty,” Carrie said of the labour dispute that threatens to close the 61-year-old plant.

Caterpillar subsidiary Progress Rail has threatened the livelihood of workers, attacked their wages and benefits and driven trailers to the plant that might be used to move the work of building locomotives elsewhere, Carrie said.

“When workers feel bullied, bad things happen,” he said.

The union doesn’t want violent confrontation, but the company has made that more likely, Carrie said.

The London labour leader fears the company will try to get replacement workers or move production to a newly refurbished plant in Muncie, Ind. where wages are less than half of what they are at the London plant.

“We’re all concerned about that. It certainly seems to be (Caterpillar’s) track record. (A move) could happen,” he said.

Caterpillar has a history of playing hardball with unions, outlasting lengthy strikes and using replacement workers south of the border — the company got the best of the United Auto Workers in the 1990s.

It’s in the face of that history that the CAW will hold a strike vote at 10 a.m. Friday at the Marconi Club.

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MONTREAL – The union representing Air Canada pilots says the airline is attempting to intimidate its members by filing a notice of dispute with the federal government in order to kick-start labour negotiations.

“It’s typical Air Canada bargaining tactics. It’s meant to escalate things. Frankly it’s meant to intimidate,” Paul Strachan, president of the Air Canada Pilots Association, said in an interview Thursday.

The carrier’s 2,900 pilots rejected a tentative agreement by a two-to-one margin in May.

Air Canada has been at odds with several of its main unions during recent negotiations and labour leaders have criticized the federal government of siding with the company.

The Canadian Auto Workers union reached a settlement in the summer for striking Air Canada customer service representatives under threat of being legislated back to work.

The flight attendants union reached two tentative settlements, both rejected by the membership, but they were prevented launching a strike when Labour Minister Lisa Raitt referred the matter to the Canada Industrial Relations Board.

The pilots association has been working over the past six months to prepare proposals that could be the basis for a new negotiated settlement.

Faced with internal political turmoil, it needed the time to replace its executive chairman, reorganize its bargaining team and survey members about what they want in a new deal.

Strachan said the airline accused CUPE-represented flight attendants of not knowing what its members wanted when it rejected a second tentative agreement. Yet it’s rushing pilots to negotiate without having completed that internal review.

“We want to make sure we do it right this time. The last thing we want is another failed ratification vote,” Strachan said.

Last week, the pilots proposed resuming talks in late November, but the Montreal-based carrier caught the ACPA off guard by filing the notice Wednesday.

The carrier said it acted to accelerate a second round of talks with pilots to achieve a negotiated settlement.

“The company is of the view that the involvement of a federally appointed conciliator would facilitate and expedite this second round of negotiation and bring it to a successful conclusion as soon as possible,” said Air Canada spokesman Peter Fitzpatrick.

But Strachan said it’s not helpful for either side to “bargain with the clock ticking in the background.”

“Now we’ll have to tighten it up and this is where balls get dropped when you start rushing things.”

Air Canada’s (TSX:AC.B) move starts the clock ticking to a potential strike, even though the federal government has threatened to intervene with other employee groups at the airline.

The conciliation process lasts up to 60 days unless extended. The parties have the right to strike or lockout 21 days after conciliation ends and must give 72 hours advance notice.

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Over 100 CAW Local 112 members working at Northstar Aerospace in Milton, Ontario rallied outside the factory on October 17 to defend their right to picket in the face of a company threat to end the strike through a legal injunction.

After just three days of Northstar workers setting up picket lines the employer threatened to file for a court injunction. This action was taken despite Northstar having issued a public statement after the strike began on October 13 that said it respected its employees and the collective bargaining process.

Shortly after the workers’ rally, Northstar backed down from their threat and agreed, instead, to establish a strike protocol with the union.

CAW Local 112 President Roland Kiehne considered this a victory for the workers who are fighting back aggressive company demands for cost cuts and trying to secure ongoing work in the facility.

“The company’s actions were completely unwarranted, in light of the peaceful, orderly and lawful pickets that have been run by our members so far,” Kiehne said.

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Oct 13 (Reuters) – Canada’s Northstar Aerospace Inc said union workers at its manufacturing facility in Milton, Ontario, began a strike on Thursday.

The 135 workers who went on strike are represented by the Canadian Auto Workers union, the company said in a statement.

The company will implement contingency arrangements to mitigate the impact of the work stoppage, it said.

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Bargaining is continuing past the noon deadline to try to avoid a strike by support staff at the University of Manitoba tomorrow morning.

Local 3007 of the Canadian Auto Workers had set a noon deadline to get a deal, but U of M public affairs director John Danakas said talks continue this afternoon, and may even continue past a 7 p.m. union meeting tonight. That meeting is scheduled to either hold a ratification vote or discuss plans to go on strike at 6 a.m. tomorrow.

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University of Manitoba support staff have voted 87 per cent in favour of a possible strike.

Canadian Auto Workers Local 3007 represents 450 U of M caretakers, groundskeepers, food services, engineering and skilled trades workers.

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LINDSAY — Workers at Lindsay’s Armada Toolworks plant could face a lockout as early as Dec. 30 after workers voted 68% in favour of rejecting the company’s final offer.

The contract for 146 Armada workers represented by the Canadian Auto Workers Local 222 expired at the end of November.

Armada has filed for a no-board report which would put the company in a legal position to lock out workers as of Dec. 30, according to a news release from the union.

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The spectre of another crippling strike at Port Metro Vancouver is being raised by angry container truckers.

They claim that rates negotiated after a bitter, five-week strike in 2005 are being undercut.

“We’ re in bargaining right now with 12 different companies,” said Gavin McGarrigle national representative for CAW, the Canadian Auto Workers union.

“We’re getting to the point where a strike option is definitely a possibility and we haven’t ruled that out yet.”

About 400 disgruntled truckers drove in a protest convoy that tied up traffic Saturday.

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Workers at Armada Toolworks Lt. in Lindsay, Ont., have voted to give their union a strike mandate in contract negotiations.

Local 222 of the Canadian Auto Workers says 89 per cent of those who voted Sunday approved the strike mandate.

Their current contract expires Nov. 30.

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Workers at Oakville’s Automodular Corporation joined a province-wide CAW (Canadian Auto Workers) Day of Action, Wednesday, calling for an end to employer demands for contract concessions.

Approximately 40 auto parts workers assembled outside Automodular’s 2335 Speers Rd. location to participate in a short rally telling auto parts industry employers, ‘Enough is enough.’

“We’re not interested in negotiating backward. We in the union have done our share with this latest crisis. The autoworker is not responsible for the downturn in this sector. The auto parts industry has been hard hit for years with unfair trade agreements, a high Canadian dollar and finally the latest global economic crisis,” said Angus MacDonald, CAW Local 1256 president, who addressed the gathering from atop a picnic table via megaphone.

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