Tile setters represented by Brick and Allied Craft Union of Canada are on strike, but there were no picket lines at the construction site of Windsor’s new family aquatic centre Tuesday morning.
Drew Dilkins, chair of the aquatic steering committee, says even if there was one, the other trade workers would have to cross the picket line because of a clause in their contract stipulating they all must work even if another trade union goes on strike.
The tile setters who are on strike at the aquatic centre are part of a Province-wide bargaining structure. An employers association bargains for all tile contractors in Ontario and the Union bargains for all of its Ontario Locals, says BACU president Kerry Wilson.
“The main issue is that the employers are insisting on shifting our members’ method of earnings from an hourly system which has been in place for over forty years to a "piecework" system where a worker would be paid by the square footage installed,” says Wilson.
Wilson says this would severely reduce the earnings of the workers and would have the effect of reducing the quality of their workmanship.
The union has been in a legal strike position since midnight on May 22, but they officially called the strike to begin at midnight on May 30.
“It cannot be predicted how long it will take to settle the matters between the two parties and so the disruption to Windsor's aquatic centre is, for the time, indefinite,” says Wilson.
Other workers at the pool site walked off the job during the elevator strike a few weeks ago, but that wasn’t supposed to happen. If it had continued past a day, Dilkins says they would have applied for an injunction.
The $78-million facility is supposed to be ready for the International Children's Games Aug. 14-19.
