HAMILTON, Ontario — Workers at railcar builder National Steel Car have approved a new contract, ending a 41-day strike by 1,475 members of the United Steelworkers.
In a Tuesday vote, 87.4% of the members of Local 7135 approved the three-year agreement, which includes a 13% wage increase over the life of the contract, with 6% the first year, and a $1,000 signing bonus. Members in the skilled trades will get an additional $1 per hour increase in the first and third years, the union said in a press release.
“We believe that we achieved what we were looking for,” said Local 7135 President Frank Crowder. “Wages were a huge issue for our members. We wanted the company to offer wage increases that met inflation and we were able to secure that.”
The union also said the new agreement will add another health and safety representative in an effort to address issues that saw three fatalities in a 21-month span at the Hamilton plant. The company was fined C$140,000 last month over one of those deaths.
Maintenance workers were set to return to work immediately to conduct plant inspections, while other union workers will return on Aug. 14.
Hal Bruckner, vice president of human resources at National Steel Car, told the Hamilton Spectator newspaper that the ratified agreement is “good news, of course; we’re in business to make railway cars. We want to get back to delivering cars to our customers.”
Workers had walked out on June 29 [see “Workers strike at Canada’s National Steel Car,” Trains News Wire, July 2, 2023].
