“This initiative by management would be used as a tool to intimidate workers and advance a culture of fear under the guise of safety,” states the President of Teamsters Canada Rail Conference Doug Finnson.”
The rail carrier explains on a unilingual English website that the
current legislation – which allows for the installation of onboard video
and voice recorders on locomotives – prevents railways from using the
recordings to adopt proactive safety measures. CP adds that legislative
amendments would make it possible to prevent accidents and ultimately,
maybe even save lives.
“This initiative by management would be used as
a tool to intimidate workers and advance a culture of fear under the
guise of safety,” states the President of Teamsters Canada Rail
Conference (TCRC) Doug Finnson. “We intend to take any and all
actions necessary to fight this unconstitutional assault on the
rights of our members and all workers in Canada because the
precedent this would create could have far reaching consequences on
the privacy rights of all Canadians.”
The
TCRC continues to support it’s documented position that allows for
the installation and use of this technology under the protected
status of the existing legislation which safeguards the data for
Transportation Safety Board use only. The union views CP’s
meaningless marketing and lobbying campaign is another attempt by
their strongly American influenced management team to weaken laws
that protect Canadians and move toward the less restrictive
legislative requirements they enjoy in their US operations.
Cockpit audio recorders have been in use in the
airline industry for decades, however, safeguards are in place in
that industry that do not violate privacy rights and have consensus
support.
“Why is this approach good for air
transportation but bad for rail transportation?” questions the union
leader. “Our members offer their full collaboration when it comes to
health and safety, but cameras fixated on them with continuous
monitoring for their entire tour of duty will in no way prevent
accidents from happening. The real solution is for government to put
an end to the self-regulation and commit sufficient resources for
inspection, compliance and enforcement of legislation designed to
protect the health and safety of workers and the Canadian public.”
The fundamental notion of protecting worker’s
rights to privacy will quickly become meaningless if the government
gives in to what the rail carrier is demanding.
The data necessary to continue improving safety
performance is all readily available through less intrusive tools
already at the railways disposal. Consequently, this attempt to
manage operations remotely is disrespectful for workers in an
already toxic workplace.
“I invite the federal government to reflect on
the impacts of what Canadian Pacific is asking for,” concludes Mr.
Finnson. “Rail disasters like the one that struck Lac-Mégantic
stress the need to more closely oversee the rail industry. Transport
Canada must extend its reflection to include existing practices and
systemic issues that could be improved before considering anything
that would affect workers’ right to privacy and strip Canadians of
their dignity.”
It should be noted that a CBC report sheds very
interesting light on the documented disregard for safety displayed
by CP managers:
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/cp-rail-bc-mountain-train-1.3930258
The Teamsters
represents 115,000 members in Canada in all industries. The
International Brotherhood of Teamsters, with which Teamsters Canada
is affiliated, has 1.4 million members in North America.
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Information:
Stéphane Lacroix, Director of Public
Relations
Telephone: 450 682-5521
Cell: 514 609-5101
Email:
slacroix@teamsters.ca
