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MONTREAL – Canada Post and the postal workers union found slivers of consensus Tuesday amid talks with a special mediator, but “a lot of ground” remains between them on the key concerns as a countrywide strike entered its fifth day.

“On smaller issues, we were able to find some progress,” said Canada Post spokesman Jon Hamilton in a phone interview.

“The special mediator has helped facilitate those discussions. So we’re going to continue to be at it. We’re committed to getting collective agreements. We don’t want arbitration,” he said.

“There’s still a lot of ground to cover.”

With deliveries at a standstill, the Crown corporation and the Canadian Union of Postal Workers are in negotiations over a pair of contracts — one for rural and suburban mail carriers that was discussed Monday, the other for urban carriers that was under the microscope on Tuesday.

The union said progress was made due in part to the presence of Ottawa’s top mediator, appointed to the task last week. Peter Simpson, director general of the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service, spent the beginning of the week at a hotel in Ottawa shuttling between the parties’ conference rooms in a back-and-forth of proposals and potential concessions.

“After 12 months of discussions, the employer finally began to move on the pressing issues. Resolving these issues could pave the way to agreements,” union president Jan Simpson said in an update to members Tuesday.

“The urban unit will find out if there is movement on their side.”

About 55,000 employees represented by the Canadian Union of Postal Workers walked off the job on Friday, shutting down operations and halting deliveries as the busy holiday season kicks off.

The union is calling for a cumulative wage hike of 24 per cent over four years, while Canada Post has offered an 11.5 per cent increase.

Other wedge issues include job security, benefits and contract work for parcel delivery on weekends.

Negotiations between Canada Post and its unionized employees began in November 2023.

On top of wage hikes to make up for inflation, the union is seeking bumps to short-term disability payouts and ten paid sick days per year. For rural and suburban mail carriers, the union also wants to include corporate vehicles for mail-carriers as well as paid meals and breaks.

Canada Post has argued that its financial situation is already dire and the union’s demands would break the bank.

In the first half of 2024, Canada Post lost nearly a half-billion dollars. The Crown corporation has reported $3 billion in losses since 2018, as Canadians sent fewer letters while competitors gobbled up even more of the parcel market.

The union counters this position by suggesting the Crown corporation reconsider its ongoing executive bonuses and expand its services to manage higher costs.

The last postal work stoppage took place starting in late October 2018, when employees carried out rotating strikes lasting 31 days.

Previous postal strikes held in 2011 and 2018 ended when the federal government passed legislation sending employees back to work.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 19, 2024.

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VANCOUVER – Environment Canada is warning that a “bomb cyclone” is expected to bring powerful winds to most of Vancouver Island and the B.C. coast, with hurricane-force gusts of 120 km/h predicted for some areas this week.

The weather agency has issued more than a dozen warnings for coastal areas, saying the peak wind speeds are expected Tuesday night and Wednesday morning.

Areas expected to be hit hardest include northern Vancouver Island and the north and central coasts, but gusts of up to 100 km/h are also forecast for heavily populated centres including Victoria and the Sunshine Coast.

The warnings stretch from Prince Rupert in the north to the southern tip of Vancouver Island, while Metro Vancouver and the Fraser Valley are the subject of a special weather statement.

The statement says residents should be prepared for power outages, downed trees and travel delays brought by what it calls a “significant fall storm.”

Environment Canada meteorologist Brian Proctor says a bomb cyclone is caused by a rapid drop in atmospheric pressure at the centre of a storm.

“Typically, with these bomb cyclones, we need a lot of cold air loss in the atmosphere to really eject itself into the low pressure centre, which really helps to deepen them, or helps them to explode,” he said in an interview Monday. “Typically, with this kind of storm, the key phenomena is going to be the wind associated.”

Environment Canada says the storm will develop about 400 kilometres off the coast of Vancouver Island on Tuesday, bringing high winds and heavy rain that afternoon.

Proctor said the storm will likely have the most impact on the west side of Vancouver Island and the central coast.

Matt MacDonald, the lead forecaster for the BC Wildfire Service, says in a social media post that models show B.C. coastal inlets could bring “hurricane force” winds and there may be waves of up to nine metres off Washington and Oregon’s coasts.

Proctor said he wouldn’t be surprised to see those kinds of conditions on B.C.’s coast.

“That would be fairly typical for this kind of track,” he said in an interview.

However, he said that would depend on the track of the low pressure centre and how close to Vancouver Island it comes in before it starts “hooking” northward.

BC Ferries said in a statement Monday that it is “closely monitoring the weather situation” and is in contact with Environment Canada.

While it initially said sailings were expected to proceed as scheduled, a later statement said that it would be providing updates on Tuesday about potential delays or cancellations.

“Our goal is to keep people moving without interruption wherever possible, and to keep our passengers informed as things change,” it said. “In the event of significant disruptions, we will work to reschedule travel or reroute passengers to the next available sailing.”

Electric utility BC Hydro said it has been monitoring the system “very closely” since last week, noting it has a “team of in-house meteorologists that track all weather events” to ensure it has crews and equipment in the right places when storms hit.

“We’re prepared for tomorrow’s storm and are ramping up crews – both BC Hydro crews and contractor crews,” it said in a statement Monday.

A La Nina winter is expected for B.C., and Proctor said the creation of bomb cyclones are amplified under those conditions, when ocean temperatures are cooler than normal.

He said the province should brace for similar storms, though not of the same magnitude.

“We’re really setting up for a fairly typical late fall, if I can put it that way, once we get past this big event of this bomb cyclone,” he said.

The bomb cyclone warnings come after a lightning storm overnight and early Monday covered parts of Metro Vancouver in hail.

B.C. has been hit by a series of powerful fall storms, including an atmospheric river that caused flash flooding in Metro Vancouver in mid-October.

The Insurance Bureau of Canada said in a news release last week that the October storm caused $110 million in insured damage claims, which prompted it to renew calls for the federal government to “fully fund” the National Flood Insurance Program.

It said insured losses related to severe weather in Canada now routinely exceed $3 billion annually and a new record has been set this year, reaching more than $7.7 billion.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 18, 2024.

VICTORIA – Premier David Eby says “kitchen table” issues in British Columbia will be the focus for his revamped, postelection cabinet that was sworn in on Monday.

Eby’s new cabinet, comprising 23 ministers and four ministers of state, features a mix of new and familiar faces elected in last month’s narrow one-seat New Democrat election win.

“The things that concern your family around the kitchen table are going to be the issues that concern our team around the cabinet table,” he said after the cabinet introduction ceremony at government house.

“Ours will be a government that listens and ours will be a government that delivers,” said Eby, adding “that was the message that people sent us here to do this job in this recent election.”

“That is something every one of these members and everyone who was elected is going to carry with them in the work they do over the next four years,” he said.

He said the priorities for the new cabinet and the NDP government will include good paying jobs, family doctors for everybody, safe communities and affordable homes.

Eby shuffled veteran ministers Adrian Dix and Mike Farnworth and introduced to cabinet several newly elected members of the legislature.

Dix, the longtime health minister who guided the province through the COVID-19 pandemic, was moved to energy and climate solutions, while Josie Osborne, a two-term MLA and a former mayor of Tofino, will take on health.

Eby said Dix was moved to energy and climate solutions because of his track record of success.

“I need someone who can deliver and Adrian is that minister,” Eby said at a news conference. “It’s critically important for our government.”

Dix will be tasked with ensuring B.C. develops its clean energy systems and markets, he said.

Osborne said as a resident and a former mayor of a rural community, she understood the health-care needs of people outside B.C.’s urban areas.

“Everybody deserves access to health care,” said Osborne, acknowledging that many rural B.C. communities have concerns about recurring hospital emergency department closures. “I hear you. I see you.”

Farnworth, B.C.’s veteran solicitor general and public safety minister, was moved out of those portfolios and into transportation and transit, and will also serve as NDP house leader.

Garry Begg, a former RCMP officer, got one of the biggest cheers when he was introduced by Eby as the new solicitor general and public safety minister, elevating him from the backbench to cabinet.

Eby introduced Begg by the nickname “Landslide” in a nod to his wafer-thin 21-vote victory in Surrey that secured the government its one-seat majority.

Brenda Bailey, the former jobs minister and a Vancouver businesswoman, moves into the crucial finance portfolio.

Newly elected MLAs also featured in the cabinet, with former broadcaster Randene Neill becoming minister of land, water and resource management, and Vancouver Police Department veteran Terry Yung named minister of state for community safety.

Among the senior cabinet ministers who kept their jobs were Housing Minister Ravi Kahlon and Attorney General Niki Sharma, whose first duty upon being reappointed was accepting the Great Seal of British Columbia from Lt.-Gov. Janet Austin.

Austin opened Monday’s swearing-in ceremony by paying tribute to former premier John Horgan, who died of thyroid cancer last week.

She called Horgan “a fine man” who loved B.C., and said she would miss his “dad jokes” and “corny” sense of humour.

Eby said after the ceremony that his team would make affordability a priority issue.

“(For) those families hit hard by inflation and rising costs, our focus will be on controlling your costs, supporting you with the cost of everything from housing to car insurance and delivering a middle-income tax cut to support you and your family in these challenging times,” he said.

During the campaign, Eby promised a $1,000 tax cut for the average family, starting next year and benefiting 90 per cent of British Columbians.

Eby faced the challenge of filling the cabinet from a caucus reduced to 47 members in the Oct. 19 election, which gave the NDP the narrowest of majorities in the 93-seat legislature.

Former B.C. Liberal cabinet minister Mike Bernier, who ran unsuccessfully as an Independent last month in his Dawson Creek-area riding, said Eby had to find ways to bring rural representation into the cabinet even though most of his members were from Metro Vancouver or Vancouver Island.

Brittny Anderson, who won in Kootenay-Central, helped fulfil that goal, being appointed minister of state for local government and rural communities.

Energy and mining were carved into two separate portfolios, with Jagrup Brar taking on the latter, now renamed mining and critical minerals.

“We have two separate ministries dedicated to major economic growth sectors for us,” Eby said.

The legislature’s youngest MLA, Ravi Parmar, entered cabinet as forests minister.

B.C. Conservative Leader John Rustad said Eby had been invisible when it comes to rural B.C., and he and his 44-member caucus were looking forward to holding the government to account on numerous issues.

Green Leader Sonia Furstenau said in a statement the party was pleased Eby appointed a cabinet with a strong representation of women in leadership roles and a female majority.

“We are particularly pleased to see Niki Sharma appointed as deputy premier and Attorney General, Tamara Davidson as Minister of Environment and Parks, and Bailey as Minister of Finance,” she said. These critical roles will have a significant impact on shaping the future of British Columbia.”

Eby said the NDP government continued to negotiate will the Greens about how the party’s two elected members could work with the government.

“I hope British Columbians see in this cabinet an experienced team that’s going to be focused on the priorities they sent us to Victoria to address,” he said.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 18, 2024.