Chief Blair Failing to Serve And Protect Citizenry

Judge lays down law on picket lines

Brodie Fenlon

Is this even legal? What right do they have to stop me? Can they really delay me?

These questions have been asked repeatedly by Torontonians stopped by striking municipal workers outside transfer stations, a courthouse, Green P parking lots, city hall and beyond.

No doubt it was on the minds of 350 patients whose medical appointments — for dialysis, cancer and cardiac procedures, to name a few — were scrubbed after workers with CUPE local 416 set up a picket outside AmbuTrans, the private, non-emergency ambulance service under contract to hospitals in Toronto, York and Peel Regions.

A court injunction yesterday against the same local offers some fresh guidance on the matter and suggests the union went way too far when it targeted private waste hauler Wasteco, a third party like AmbuTrans, that has nothing to do with the strike except that it has been busier collecting more trash from its existing customers.

Evidence heard by Justice Mary A. Sanderson included:

• three Wasteco trucks were prevented from exiting a waste transfer site for 14 hours

• a few days later, union members subjected a driver to verbal insults and threatening comments

• At 2 a.m. on June 30, a pickup truck with four large men blocked a Wasteco truck on Wellington Street for an hour. Police were called but made no arrests and laid no charges.

• workers delayed trucks for three hours at the company's Bridgeland Avenue site, then prevented 30 trucks from exiting the firm's transfer site at Orenda Road.

"While union members have the right to engage in informational picketing, they have no right to obstruct access to a third party's premises or otherwise unduly interfere with that third party's business," Justice Sanderson ruled.

The judge's order says the union can delay Wasteco trucks no longer than five minutes and may not "stack" vehicles by queuing them beyond the five-minute limit.

In an unusual move, the judge also ordered the union to pay Wasteco's legal costs, which will be decided later.

The judge made no bones that the picketing had caused the company irreparable harm.

"I do not accept the submission of counsel for the union that Wasteco's claims in this regard are based on bald allegations. The evidence on irreparable loss here goes well beyond 'bald allegation' and extends to criminal and tortious conduct."

The judge's order also suggests residents and businesses can forget about calling Toronto Police if they have a problem with picketers. She wrote: "It is clear that the Toronto Police have instructed their officers to remain neutral and leave the matter of delays in entering and exiting premises caused by picketers to be resolved by agreement, the Labour Relations Board or the Courts."

I spotted CUPE National President Paul Moist this morning outside city hall and asked him about the injunction, the awarding of costs, and the picketing protocol. He had little to say.

"There's no story there. That happens some time and other times it doesn't. That would be in the hands of our legal counsel."