Overview
- The transit agency asked Quebec’s labour minister to appoint a mediator for negotiations with bus and metro drivers.
- About 4,500 drivers plan to strike on Nov. 1, 15 and 16, which could coincide with a maintenance action set for Oct. 31 to Nov. 28.
- Maintenance workers say they will refuse overtime and restrict service outside rush hours after earlier walkouts disrupted a network with roughly 1 million daily trips.
- General director Marie-Claude Léonard said a mediator could aid a deal but warned current union demands would require a 10 percent cut to bus service.
- The agency is staging a negotiation blitz as it awaits a mediator, while the drivers’ union says it is open to mediation after more than 50 sessions and the agency cites $100 million in planned cuts and 300 job abolitions over three years.