Black River-Matheson labour dispute reaches the six-month mark

The labour dispute in the Township of Black River-Matheson has reached the six-month mark.

A dozen municipal employees have been on the picket line since Oct. 15, but the dispute nearly came to an end earlierthis month.

In a written statement,Mayor Doug Bender said the townand union reached a memorandum of settlement on all outstanding items for anew collective agreement on April 3.

"This included a 14 per cent increase over four years, the implementation of a wage grid as amended by the unionand vacation time improvements," the statement said.

The plan was for the members of the Canadian Union of Public Employeesto return to work on April 15.

But according to Bender, the dealfell through when the union placed a return-to-work protocol on the table.

CUPELocal 1490 president Serge Bourchard told CBC News the return-to-work protocol would protect employees from any reprisals once they're back on the job.

"We have filed an unfair labour practice, we have filed a challenge in court to their unconstitutional trespass orders," Bourchard said in a statement.

"And we offered to drop them in exchange for the employer agreeing they will not pursue reprisals or investigations into members who walked the picket line."

But in his statement, Bender said the legal challenges the union wants dropped include chargesfiled with local police against striking union members.

"The township cannot order individuals to drop personal charges. In addition, an investigation is underway by a third party that is looking into whether or not employees acted in a manner that was not in keeping with normal strike behaviour," the statement said.

Bouchard said in an interview that the union does not expect any criminal charges to be dropped.

"That is 100 per cent on the Crown. We cannot tell the Crown what to do," he said.

He said the return-to-work protocol amounts to a "forgive and forget" clause.

"It seems like we're so close, yet so far," he said.

"And I don't know why it's had to go on so long. This could be done very quickly."