Le climat des relations du travail à Montréal et à Toronto Montreal and Toronto: Differing Industrial Relations Climates

Résumé

Cet article compare le climat des relations du travail des régions métropolitaines de Montréal et de Toronto pour le secteur privé de leur activité économique.

Abstract

This paper compares different indicators of strike activity in the Montréal and Toronto Metropolitan areas. It is found that both the incidence and the duration of strikes are higher in Montréal than Toronto. For example, man days lost are higher in Montréal for the whole period 1970-1979, except 1974. They are also higher for each and for every large private industrial sectors, manufacturing industry included, without exception. It appears, in addition, that the duration of strikes which occur during the collective agreement are 4 times longer in Montréal than Toronto for the manufacturing sector, and 9 times longer for the transportation, communications and public utilities' sectors. These results clearly point to the relative difficulties of Montréal in terms of its current industrial relation's climate.

While it is the contention of the authors that such a result might have been temporarily produced by the unions' intention to obtain wage parity with Toronto, as well as the previous wage policies of the Québec public sector, it remains that such a climate offered a net relative disadvantage for firm and industry localization in the Montréal Metropolitan area.