Quebec’s Montreal transit dispute signals new era for labour relations
The dispute that has curtailed bus and métro service in Montreal is more than just a local inconvenience for commuters. For HR leaders across Canada, it is an early signal of how far governments may be prepared to go when work stoppages disrupt services that touch a broad segment of the public.
The Quebec government is preparing to invoke a statute adopted earlier this year, often referred to as Bill 89, ahead of its scheduled implementation date of November 30th. By doing so, it would gain immediate authority to step into the ongoing strike by roughly 2,400 maintenance employees at the Société de transport de Montréal (STM), whose walkout has restricted transit service largely to peak hours and late evenings since the end of October.
For human-resources professionals, particularly those in unionized workplaces or organizations delivering public-facing services, the STM conflict offers a preview of a more interventionist environment in which governments – and not just employers and unions – play a decisive role in shaping the outcome of labour disputes.
The backdrop to this dispute is an unusually intense period of labour activity in Quebec.
In 2023, the province recorded about 691 work stoppages, the highest number ever documented and well above its previous peak from the mid-1970s. Strikes constitute the overwhelming majority of those stoppages. At...
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