Thunder Bay Transit employees will soon find themselves in a legal strike position now that contract negotiations with the city have stalled.

Charlie Brown, president of Amalgamated Transit Union (ATU) Local 966, said the union filed for a no-board report after talks broke down Thursday morning.

The union will be legally entitled to take some sort of job action – for example, a strike or work-to-rule campaign – 17 days after the province receives the report. The city would be in a legal position to lock out the workers.

“We‘re not talking money at all at this point in time,” he said in an interview. “We‘re looking at a number of concessions that the city‘s asking our bargaining group for. We‘re looking at a reduction in certain areas of our benefit plan, which we find unacceptable. They‘re looking to increase to an unlimited number of part-time workforce for drivers, which we think is going to erode the full-time workforce.”

Thursday morning‘s negotiation meeting lasted about 10 minutes, Brown said.

“We‘ve been in negotiations for almost a year-and-a-half now,” he said. “We‘ve been at the table 16 times, and what was presented on the table from both parties on the first day is still on the table today.”

A strike vote is to be held Aug. 29, Brown said.

Assuming nothing is settled before the union is in a legal strike position, Brown said the union does have a plan.

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