Re:City transit back on track
April 28
Queen's Park was mistaken in ordering striking TTC workers back to their jobs. In doing so, MPPs have turned the TTC into a de facto essential service, as the two sides will now go to binding arbitration, with all the extra costs to taxpayers that will entail.
It's much better to allow the collective bargaining system to work the way it was intended. Let the workers walk the picket lines for days, or even weeks, if necessary. The threat of a lengthy strike would have the effect of tempering the demands of union members, who would actually face a significant financial penalty to achieve their goals. And it would force management to work hard to avoid a strike knowing that it can't just rely on the government to step in and then throw everything in the lap of an arbitrator.
While this would no doubt inconvenience large numbers of passengers, it would hardly be a crisis, as some suggest.
Toronto suffered through a three-week transit strike in the 1970s. Traffic congestion on the city's main arteries was intense in those days, too. And ridership numbers were even higher than today.
Somehow, the city survived.
Matt Watson, Burlington
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