Thousands of carpenters have unstrapped their tool belts and laid down their hammers in their first work action in decades.
The Carpenters' District Council of Ontario's (CDCO) 15,000 members walked off the job at midnight Sunday night after a series of failed contract talks with various employers. The strike action was solidified after a union vote over the weekend, in which 75 per cent of those participating rejected the latest proposal from the employers.
Mike Yorke, the CDCO’s president and director of public affairs and innovation, said that a strike was the last thing its members wanted.
"Carpenters, like other construction workers, kept working on job sites to build critical infrastructure all the way through the COVID crisis," said Yorke. "Their work was seen as essential during the pandemic and because of this, and because of the spiralling cost of living increases, our Union and our members believe that wages now have to be increased."
Yorke said the union is more than willing to sit down with employers at any time to work out an agreement.
"Nobody should be under any illusion that members of the Carpenters’ Union are willing to settle for anything other than the fair wage increases, which construction workers and their families deserve given everything that they and their families have gone through in the last two-and-a-half years and everything that they and their families are facing now," said Yorke.
Carpenters and Joiners Local 494 represents carpenters in Windsor-Essex and Chatham-Kent. According to the union's Facebook page, picket lines were set up along Front Street in LaSalle on Monday, and on McDougall near the new Catholic Central High School in Windsor.
Windsor News Today has reached out to the union for further comment on this work action but had not heard back as of early Monday evening.
