British Columbia’s Telephone Workers’ Occupation of 1981

Elaine Bernard

For five days in February 1981 telephone workers in Canada’s westernmost province of British Columbia operated the phone exchanges province-wide under workers’ control, and occupied the enterprise.¹⁵⁴ This action constituted one of the most innovative strikes in North America. The occupation resulted, for a brief period of time, in the operation of a privately owned utility under workers’ control and allowed observers a glimpse at how things could be at the telephone company if the workers were in charge.

This radical action neither arose from the traditional strength of the labor movement and its power to stop production, nor was it an ambitious leap by a radical union. Rather, the union turned to the occupation because of its own relative weakness, which forced it to widen its support as well as to seek new allies and develop new tactics. The occupiers saw themselves as not only engaging in a labor dispute, but at a higher level, also protecting a public good (telecommunications) from mismanagement by its private sector monopoly owners—BC Telephone.

The occupation of BC Telephone was the direct product of a decade-long battle between workers and management on issues of technological change. The 1970s had heralded the computer age at the phone company, and the central concern of the workers facing this massive technological change was job security. Automation meant that fewer workers, with less training, could maintain and operate the telephone network. While the company argued that jobs would be secure because of the overall growth in the telecommunications and information field, the workers did not believe it. In the post–World War II era, phone workers had experienced a massive technological change with the move from operator-handled calls to automatic dial. With this change, the workforce had grown while the new system was being installed, tested, and integrated. But this temporary growth was deceptive because once a majority of the exchanges had been changed over to the new dial system, the parallel manual system disappeared, and with it went hundreds of jobs.

New Technology and Telephone Worker Labor Conflict

An additional concern with technological change was the continuing loss of collective bargaining power by the union. As early as 1969, when the union threatened to take their first strike action in fifty years, a company negotiator confided to the federal conciliation officer that the company did not fear a strike. Management was confident that it could maintain operations throughout a strike; it also knew that “no telephone union [had] ever won a strike,” even though strikes in the industry lasted “on an average seventy days” (Department of Labour 1969). While the 1969 strike lasted more than a month, as predicted by management the company had sufficient supervisory staff, non–bargaining unit workers, and professional employees to provide a powerful strikebreaking force that maintained the network during the strike. The new wave of automation would make the job of strikebreaking even easier.

The decade preceding the 1981 occupation saw constant conflict between the union and company over the contracting out of work, changes in work methods and organization, the transfer of tasks from one component to another within the bargaining unit, attempts to transfer bargaining union work to non–bargaining unit personnel, reclassification of jobs, and the opening of self-service Phone Mart stores. All these issues were rooted in the workers’ growing concern for job security and the weakening of their union. In their quest for job security, the workers found themselves fighting a defensive battle to preserve their jobs and their work, a battle that brought the union into conflict with the company’s view of management rights. To the company, choices of equipment, the organization of labor in the workplace, and decisions on the nature of work not explicitly covered by the contract were the sole concern of management. It follows from such a view that changes in work and equipment, regardless of the consequences for labor, were the sole right of management (Bernard 1982).

Employer Lockout

In the 1977 negotiations this conflict culminated in a three-month lockout. Using the restrained bargaining climate accompanying the federal government’s wage- and price-control legislation, the company demanded the elimination of the restrictive contracting-out clause and the inclusion of a management rights clause in the new collective agreement. With the increased use of computers at BC Telephone, management wanted to rid itself of this restrictive clause in order to contract out repairs and maintenance of computers. However, the union was adamant about preserving the existing language, which assured that the union members would continue to service and be retrained in the use of new equipment, thereby constituting an essential component of the workforce’s job security.

With the breakdown of negotiations in July 1977, the union took a successful strike vote. Recognizing the difficulty of applying pressure on the company through a full strike, the union opted for selective one-day walkouts. The company countered the union’s strategy of rotating strikes with rotating lockouts. By the end of November 1977, the entire unionized work-force, approximately ten thousand workers, were on the streets, staying out until February 1978. The new collective agreement that settled this dispute included 1) the retention of most of the old wording to the contracting-out clause, 2) the addition of a special union-company contracting-out and technological change committee, and 3) a guarantee by the company that regular employees with two or more years’ seniority would not lose their jobs as a result of technological change.

In spite of agreement on the new contract, the 1977–78 lockout ended with a great deal of bitterness. The usually routine signing of a back-to-work agreement prolonged the lockout for a week when, as a requirement for returning to work, the company demanded that each employee sign a statement guaranteeing no more job action and assuring his/her willingness to work alongside management personnel. Additionally, the company informed the union that they would call employees back to work at their discretion over a nine-day period. The union refused to accept these terms and the company remained adamant that the individual employee guarantees were a prerequisite to any return to work. The union decided to break the deadlock and force an end to the lockout by publicly announcing that all employees would be returning to work on Monday, February 13, whether a back-to-work agreement was signed or not. The prospect of thousands of workers returning to work and congregating outside BC Telephone buildings around the province brought sufficient pressure on the company that a nondiscriminatory return-to-work agreement acceptable to the union was signed (Vancouver Province 1978; 1980).

This dramatic ending to the 1977–78 lockout assured that the atmosphere at BC Telephone would remain tense, with most workers recognizing that the settlement was simply a pause before the next round in the continuing dispute. It was little more than a year later when the union and company began bargaining again, in the fall of 1979, on a contract that expired in January 1980. The union recognized that it was in for another long, hard battle and suspected that the company felt that the three-month lockout in 1977–78 had sapped the union’s strength. From this position of weakness the union was driven to seek new tactics in order to apply pressure on the company for a settlement.

Labor Militancy

The union again turned to a strategy of economic pressure through selective job action, though this time more carefully targeted. It also sought to rally public pressure to force the company to maintain and improve service and prevent a lockout of workers that might further reduce service. The key to the public campaign was the union’s unprecedented intervention in the company’s rate-increase hearings of the federal regulatory body, the Canadian Radio-Television Commission (CRTC).

In this remarkable set of hearings, which lasted a record forty-one days (the longest in the CRTC’s history), the union opposed the company’s rate-increase application on the grounds that any increase in cost to consumers should be contingent on an improvement in service. The union argued that the company’s massive automation campaign was not designed to improve service to the public but rather to create an outlet for the sale of GTE (BC Telephone’s parent company) equipment, with telephone subscribers in British Columbia footing the bill through higher rates. The union opposed the company’s centralization plans, including the proposed office closures, which were estimated to eliminate 850 jobs from small communities around the province and millions of dollars from the local economies. Union witnesses testified that the company was reducing the quality of service to customers while at the same time driving up the rates of telephone service (CRTC 1980b; see also testimony in CRTC 1980a).

In aligning with consumers and community groups in opposition to the company’s requested rate increase, the telephone workers played an invaluable role as expert witnesses. They were experts in the telecommunications industry, and the CRTC intervention helped consolidate this consciousness. As well, the hearings gave the union a public forum to argue that the company, not the workers, was responsible for inadequate service and high telephone rates. The union was taking the offensive by publicly challenging management’s plan for the future of the telephone network. Workers had left the traditional industrial relations terrain of the wage and benefit package and were raising the issue of the company’s use of new technology, demanding that the company justify its program.

Worker Direct Action at BC Telephone

On the economic front, the union had started a “Super Service” campaign early in 1980, a form of work-to-rule in which workers followed company regulations to the letter, resulting in production sinking to all-time lows. With the company’s rejection of a conciliation report, the union escalated its job action. Starting September 22, 1980, 530 craft workers in Special Services, one of the company’s most lucrative sectors, reported to work but refused all assignments except emergency repair work. This targeted action was aimed at BC Telephone’s moneymaking areas, including its major business accounts; it did not affect the vast majority of telephone subscribers.

The striking workers reported to work and then “sat-in” in the coffee rooms, garages, or spare rooms in the compound. There were no pickets because the purpose of the selective strike was to place economic pressure on the company while leaving the majority of employees on the job. As the striking workers were carrying on the battle for the whole union, they were paid 70 percent of their gross wage from the union’s strike fund. To help fund the selective strike, the more than ten thousand employees remaining on the job were asked to contribute thirteen dollars a week to the strike fund.

Within weeks, the selective strike produced a significant backlog in construction and switchboard installations and repair. The company began sending out supervisors to replace the striking employees. The union responded by following the supervisors to the job sites with flying picket squads. As supervisors left the BC Telephone buildings, they were followed through the streets by union pickets. As a result of the union’s flying squads, most companies with an organized workforce decided to wait until the end of the dispute rather than risk a picket and a shutdown of their job site.

In early November, the company obtained an injunction against the union’s flying pickets, limiting picketing to two individuals per building entrance. At the beginning of December, the company was granted variance in the original injunction. The new wording of the court order allowed the company to expel the 530 sit-in strikers from company property throughout the province. It prohibited the union “from trespassing on any premises owned, leased or otherwise in the possession of the Plaintiff in the province of British Columbia by sitting in and refusing to leave such premises within ten minutes of being told by the Plaintiff to leave and not return until notified by the Plaintiff.” With the expulsion from company property of the 530 strikers and the new wording of the injunction, the company appeared to be preparing for a lockout (BC Telephone 1980).

Early in 1981, negotiations started again with the aid of a federal mediator, but by the middle of the month they had once again broken off. A week later the company initiated a campaign of selective suspensions. Starting in mid-January, the company suspended a few hundred workers a week.

The union, having paid the original 530 strikers 70 percent of their gross wage, continued the policy for the additional workers put on the streets through the escalating suspensions.

The union’s tactic of a selective strike had been calculated to soften the employer by shutting down some of BC Telephone’s most lucrative services. But as the company was well aware, the selective strike also took a toll on the union, with the growing ranks of locked-out employees draining the union’s dwindling strike fund, eventually leaving the union with no money and with all of its members locked out. As well, the company avoided the unfavorable publicity that would accompany a mass lockout by locking out only a few hundred workers at a time through suspensions for the duration of the dispute.

Employer Intimidation of Workers

By the end of January 1981, close to one thousand workers were off the job. On January 29, the CRTC brought down its decision, granting the company its rate increase with the warning that a “minimum acceptable level of service quality” had to be reached by the end of 1981 or the commission would take “action appropriate to the response of the company” (CRTC 1981).

There was a general feeling among the workers that, now that the company had received all it had asked of the CRTC, a total lockout was imminent. The union’s strategy, unchanged since September, was starting to falter in face of the company’s selective lockouts. In closed sessions of convention in January, the union had brainstormed on various actions that could be taken in the face of a lockout, including a possible union occupation of BC Telephone buildings. The union’s strike coordinator had asked local strike captains to discreetly poll their members to ascertain whether they would be willing to stay on the job in case of a company attempt at a full-scale lockout.

The occupation began on Tuesday, February 3, when about two dozen phone workers in Nanaimo and Duncan on Vancouver Island were suspended for “going slow.” In response to the suspensions, which the workers interpreted as a prelude to a full lockout in Nanaimo, the switchmen gathered in the lunchroom of the company’s Nanaimo headquarters on Fitzwilliam Street and occupied the telephone building. The occupiers secured the doors and posted groups of union members at the main entrance. The door committee asked for union cards and checked identification of personnel seeking admission into the building. Management personnel were allowed to remain in the building but were relegated to a suite of offices on the ground floor. And once they had left, they were not permitted reentrance into the building. Workers replaced all supervisors and the occupiers took over responsibility for continued staffing of the operating boards and maintaining the switching equipment. From late afternoon well into the evening, shop stewards phoned workers at home, setting up shift schedules to cover the boards twenty-four hours a day and to provide security staff for the buildings.

Worker Resilience

By evening, reinforcements started to arrive with sleeping bags, snacks, and provisions for a long stay. The unionists vowed to stay in the buildings “until we get our contract.” Defending their action, the occupiers explained, “If we leave, we feel the public will get inferior service from the supervisory personnel, who are not trained to operate the equipment properly.” A local union official told reporters, “We’re just your common or garden variety switchmen, and when people, ordinary people, get desperate enough to take a building over things are getting pretty desperate.” In reply to the company’s claim that the switchmen had not been producing, the union spokesperson explained, “When you’ve been sixteen months without a contract you’re not exactly a star performer.... Morale had been very low and hasn’t been getting any better.” He charged that the company had been keeping “everyone in a state of turmoil and upset,” with people becoming “more and more frustrated” (Vancouver Sun 1981a).

The occupation brought about a complete change in atmosphere in the Nanaimo telephone building. Grinning faces from people enjoying their jobs could be seen everywhere. A makeshift banner announcing “Under New Management, T.W.U.” was hung from the microwave tower with smaller door signs proclaiming “B.C. Tel, Now 100% Canadian Owned.” Operating boards were fully staffed, with experienced operators teaching clerical and craft workers the rudiments of operating. “It’s almost been a carnival since we took over,” commented an occupant. “People are glad to be free of supervisors.” As word of the occupation spread, BC Telephone workers throughout the province called the Nanaimo office with messages of support and encouragement (Vancouver Sun 1981a; Nanaimo Times 1981).

In contrast to the jovial atmosphere in Nanaimo, there was increased tension in every other phone center in the province. Over two months before, the company had obtained an injunction that specifically prohibited sit-ins. While the union saw its action as a defensive move aimed at preventing a company lockout, few thought that the courts would side with the union. The union executive met all day Wednesday to discuss a course of action, and two union officers were sent to Nanaimo to view the occupation firsthand and take a report to the executive.

In the other telephone offices throughout the province, workers spent Wednesday discussing the Nanaimo action, asking themselves: If a request came from the union office for a province-wide occupation, would I participate ? Nanaimo provided a valuable example. Newspaper articles and television news items from Nanaimo showed that the occupation was peaceful and the workers were enjoying themselves. Initial reaction of the public and press was not unfavorable. As well, the news reports clearly showed that the action was not a desperate act of an isolated minority. The occupiers in Nanaimo were as diverse a group of telephone workers as existed in any other center in the province. A union member in Nanaimo struck a common chord when he stated, “We’re not playing snakes and ladders here. I’ve got a wife and kids. I need to get a decent living out of this company and I’m going to put my job on the line for it.”

Workers Escalate Occupations

On Thursday morning, February 5, the union extended the occupations throughout the province, calling telephone workers around the province with instructions to take over service. By noon, the occupations had swept British Columbia. The union president defended the workers’ takeover, explaining that in response to “provocations” and a company “attempt to force a lockout” the workers had decided to “maintain the telephone service . . . staying on the job and providing basic telephone service.” The union was careful in its statements to use defensive wording, referring to its action as “staffing the offices for essential services” (TWU 1981).

The occupied exchanges across the province were quickly transformed. Supervisors were asked either to leave the buildings or to remain in designated areas. Most management personnel opted to go home. Supervisors, police, or reporters wishing to inspect the buildings were granted entry and accompanied on their tours by union members. There were two main assignments in each building: securing entrances in order to restrict access to the buildings and ensure that the union stayed in control, and staffing the operating boards. Strike leaders in many areas stayed the full five days inside the buildings, but the vast majority of workers entered and left the buildings according to union-organized schedules.

The union executive set out general rules of conduct in the occupied buildings, including the provision that “there is to be no damage and no violence.” The union’s position in the face of a possible police attempt to expel the occupiers was to urge members to resist passively by sitting or lying down, forcing the police to remove each worker bodily. Workers held meetings in most occupied buildings and worked out shifts, assignments, and “occupation rules.”

With the workers in control, the workplace regimentation demanded by the company was abandoned. Operators were no longer required to place a flag on the supervisor’s desk when going to the washroom. Breaks were taken as required, and no one was reprimanded for taking too long with a caller. If workers found that calls were building up, they recruited more operator volunteers and trained them on the operating equipment. Operators varied their responses from the rigid mechanical replies demanded by the company; in some areas operators agreed to answer directory assistance inquiries with “T.W.U. directory assistance” or “BC Tel, under workers’ control.” Workers rotated their jobs, helping to alleviate the monotony. Many workers toured the buildings and were introduced to jobs and tasks they had heard about during their years with the telephone company but had never seen in practice. For many, it was the first time they had seen other areas in the buildings. In a number of buildings operator lounges and coffee rooms were transformed into child-care centers.

But the key difference was the atmosphere of cooperation and responsibility. Craft and clerical workers gained new respect for the operators and greater sympathy for the stress involved in that job. More than one craft worker abandoned operating after only a few hours, in disbelief that anyone could work under such conditions for seven hours a day. For the first time in many years, telephone workers began to feel proud of the work they did. They were still able to assert some control and authority, but it was limited because the pace and structure of work were dictated by the machinery. Most felt a tremendous relief from the feeling of being constantly monitored.

The five days during which the union occupied the telephone exchanges had an exciting quality to them. In most areas of the world, the seizure of the telephone exchanges by workers would constitute the first act of a revolution. While the media characterized the occupation as “anarchy,” most saw it as a further escalation of a long-standing labor dispute (Vancouver Province 1981a). By seizing the telephone buildings the union had gone beyond the normal bounds of collective bargaining, but the union members felt that their inability to have any effect on the telephone company through traditional tactics made the occupation necessary and, indeed, justified.

A unique set of circumstances combined to allow the union to win public sympathy in this dispute. The drawn-out CRTC rate hearings had brought BC Telephone under public fire. In the highly publicized hearings, British Columbians were constantly reminded of the company’s large profits and arrogant management. As the phone workers argued that the company’s rate increase was not merited and criticized the company’s quality of service, there was little public sympathy left for the company.

Mass Support for Workers’ Action

When the company refused to sign the conciliation report, it was widely condemned for deteriorating labor relations. The union’s occupation was a peaceful and disciplined action, which saw the continuation of basic telephone service for the public. For many, it was a novelty, with subscribers able to chat with operators. By continuing to staff the operating services, the union was able to show the public, more clearly than any press statements could, its desire to maintain service. With the union in control the pressure was now on the company.

In addition to public attention and support, the dispute had been closely monitored by the province’s union central, the BC Federation of Labour. The Federation’s largest private-sector union and the International Woodworkers of America (IWA) had intervened along with the telephone workers to oppose the BC Telephone rate increase. With the province-wide takeover of telephone buildings, the Federation called a special meeting of affiliated staff and proposed a strategy of support for the telephone workers as well as three other groups of workers on strike at the same time. The Federation characterized the disputes as part of a wider campaign by the Employers Council of British Columbia to “stonewall” on collective bargaining, using courts, injunctions, and industrial inquiry commissions to drag out disputes and avoid bargaining. In response to this escalating offensive, the Federation announced that it would initiate an “escalating program of economic action” in support of the striking workers. The Federation president promised, “We will win these strikes using the full force of our militant tradition.” The Federation president characterized this new stage in the dispute as an “industrial relations war on the employers of British Columbia” (BC Federation of Labour 1981a).

The following day, leaders of the BC Federation of Labour underlined their support of the occupation by touring the occupied William Farrell Building at 768 Seymour Street in Vancouver. The visit boosted the morale of the telephone workers by demonstrating the support of the Federation. Commenting on the significance of this tour, the Vancouver Province termed the action an endorsement of the TWU’s takeover, warning that it constituted a “recipe for anarchy.” “Now that the precedent of supporting a takeover of property has been set” asked the Province, “in the future might we not expect to see, for example, longshoremen taking over the wharves? Bus drivers seizing their buses? Tellers taking over banks? All could be equally justified” (1981a).

Linking to Global Mass Actions

The occupation coincided with a fortuitous time in world events. Throughout the days of the occupation, the press carried stories on the occupation of factories and worksites in Poland by the trade union Solidarity. Most Western leaders were publicly defending the Polish workers and condemning the Polish government. This stance in effect gave legitimacy to occupations as a form of popular dissent.

The openness with which the TWU welcomed reporters into the occupied BC Telephone buildings made it clear that the workers felt they had nothing to hide and did not fear public scrutiny. The press tours also allowed the union to reject company allegations that damage was being done to equipment. As well, the occupiers had a chance to make their case to the press, explaining firsthand many of their long-standing grievances.

The vulnerability of the equipment in the buildings occupied by the union made it highly unlikely the police would risk a surprise expulsion or raid. In fact, as far as the police were concerned, until the courts presented them with a warrant, the occupation was part of a labor dispute and they had no plans to intervene. For its part, the union had guaranteed that no damage to equipment would take place. But the situation could change quickly with an attempted expulsion of the workers. While the union had asked workers passively to resist an expulsion attempt, in the heat of such a confrontation it would be difficult to predict the reaction of the workers or the police. As well, any action taking place in one part of the province could instantly be communicated to all other occupied centers as the workers were occupying the province’s central communication network. In addition to British Columbia’s intra-provincial telecommunications links, the occupiers handled telecommunications to Asia, Canada’s west coast defense communications network, and national television and radio connections. Any attempt to isolate one exchange would require a complete communications shutdown for cities or even regions. To risk such a communications shutdown was unthinkable.

Before the extension of the occupation across the province, the company was in the process of seeking contempt charges against the union for the Nanaimo takeover. BC Telephone charged that the December 1980 injunction specifically prohibited sit-ins, and the mass occupation was in contempt of this injunction. A court date was set for the following Monday, February 9, and over the weekend the occupiers discussed the possible outcome of the court hearing on the contempt charges.

Workers Face Legal Challenge and Court Orders

In its defense, the union argued that the occupation was provoked by the company’s suspension of telephone workers in Duncan and Nanaimo. The union’s lawyer outlined the peaceful nature of the sit-ins and noted that there had been no damage to company equipment. The occupation had in fact defused the mounting antagonisms at the telephone company. By implication, the interests of the public had been served by the continuation of the telephone service by the union. In an affidavit to the court, a union official from Nanaimo stated, “It is my opinion and the unanimous opinion of the executive of Local 3 [Nanaimo] of the Telecommunications Workers Union that we have averted a much more serious confrontation between the union and the Company” and that relations between the workers and lower management had improved as a result of the occupation (Supreme Court of British Columbia 1981).

The court rejected the union’s argument, denouncing the union for setting itself as sole arbiter of “what is in the best interests of the public, the union members, and even the company.” Finding the union guilty of criminal contempt, the judge charged that “a more blatant affront to the authority of this Court, the law and the basic principles of an ordered society would be difficult to imagine.” The court ruled that the union would be fined an undetermined amount and that the fine would be increased for each day the union continued in the occupation (ibid.). The sentencing was suspended for two days, as the court awaited the union’s response to the order that it evacuate the buildings.

Workers and Union End Occupation

While the union had pledged to remain in the buildings until a contract was signed, the union leadership felt that with the court conviction they would eventually be forced out. The discussion turned to whether or not to follow through with the tactic of passive resistance. The union executive felt that the tactic would divide the union, with some members opting to remain in the buildings until carried out and others walking out on their own. The solidarity, cooperation, and general good feeling built up during the occupation would be lost if some workers left the buildings out of fear of arrest or physical intimidation. As well, the confrontation with police inherent in the tactic might lead to damage and violence, which, regardless of circumstances, would be blamed on the union. The union would lose the support it enjoyed to date.

A second tactic—defiance of the court order—was discussed, but the majority view was that this would lead to the smashing of the union. With the union convicted of criminal contempt, the TWU was no longer taking on just the phone company. Defiance of the court order meant the union had to contend with the police, the courts, and possibly the military—in short, the Canadian state.

Neither of these two alternatives was considered realistic, and so the union executive decided to order an end to the occupation. With the workers on the street and public sympathy behind the union, they reasoned, the dispute could still be won. In a communication sent to the occupied buildings, the union leadership commended the telephone workers for the occupation, stating, “We have provided the people of British Columbia with telephone service despite countless management provocations designed to lock us out.” It described the court ruling as “granting the company the lockout which B.C. Tel had not been able to achieve on its own” and promised escalation in the form of a province-wide strike. The statement included instructions to be followed during the evacuation of the buildings. Anticipating that the company would accuse workers of sabotage, the union instructed local areas to arrange for tours of all occupied buildings; only after establishing that no telephone equipment or facility had been damaged were the workers to leave the company premises together in a disciplined, orderly march out (TWU 1981b).

Most of the buildings were vacated later Monday evening or early Tuesday morning. The one exception was 768 Seymour, BC Telephone’s “nerve center” The tour of the twelve-floor building started at 9:00 a.m. on Tuesday and ended with a march out at noon. Trade unionists, largely construction workers from downtown Vancouver, left their job sites shortly before noon and gathered in front of the BC Telephone building in a massive show of solidarity. The demonstration filled the street and crowded into a four-story parking garage opposite the building. At noon, the telephone workers marched out of the building led by a unionist playing the bagpipes.

For the first few days of the all-out strike, TWU locals around the province sent flying pickets to shut down anything remotely connected to BC Telephone. The union leadership warned that the union was awaiting sentencing on conviction for contempt of a court injunction and that further violations of the injunction would leave the union in a precarious position. Local strike captains were told to restrict picketing to two workers per building entrance. The return to the streets after the five-day occupation left emotions running high.

Outcome and Analysis of BC Telephone Workers’ Occupation

With the end of the occupation, and in light of the national attention the dispute had garnered, the federal labor minister sent his senior mediator to end the dispute. Negotiations were started but broke off after six days when the company demanded that any settlement be contingent upon a further telephone rate hike. The demand shocked even the mediator, who claimed, “We have an agreement, but I can’t cope with a situation where one party [BC Tel] puts a third party [CRTC] into the picture.” Writing a rate increase into the collective agreement was, in the words of the mediator, “a new experience in any mediation I’ve been involved in.” The federal labor minister called it “bizarre” and characterized the demand as “totally outside the field of labor relations . . . I am not aware in my experience of any occasion in history in which any utility company ever before thought to put such a clause in a collective agreement,” he explained (Vancouver Sun 1981b).

The newspapers were also quick to condemn the company’s proposal. The Vancouver Sun termed it “corporate blackmail,” charging that “with one crude slash the company has cut its own credibility in this dispute.” The Province termed the company’s proposal “preposterous,” stating that “no company can expect a guaranteed recovery of its costs and such a suggestion can come only from someone dwelling in Never-Never Land” (Vancouver Province 1981b, Vancouver Sun 1981c).

In response to the public outcry, the company agreed to reopen negotiations with a new mediator; on March 2 a tentative agreement was reached. But the dispute was far from over. During the course of the strike, supervisors had fired a total of twenty-four unionists for strike-related activities. The union regarded these firings as victimizations and contended that if it allowed the company to get away with these firings, “Every struck employer would simply fire strikers to weaken the union and break the strike” (Clark 1981).

The company argued that the fired employees had “abused their strike privilege,” a statement that infuriated unionists, who felt that strike action was a right, not a privilege. BC Telephone proposed that the union seek reinstatement of the twenty-four through the grievance procedure. The company urged that the rest of the strikers return to work until the fate of the twenty-four was settled. This proposal was rejected by the union and, on March 6, talks broke off once again (Vancouver Province 1981c).

In the last week of February, the BC Federation of Labour announced that one-day general strikes were to be held in different regions of the province in an escalating campaign in support of the telephone workers. The Federation warned that the one-day actions might culminate in a province-wide general strike. Nanaimo, where the occupation had begun and a city noted for its strong labor traditions, was appropriately chosen as the center for the first strike (Calgary Herald 1981; BC Federation of Labour 1981b).

On Friday, March 6, Nanaimo was closed down for one day. Ferries, buses, pulp and paper operations, the wood mill, the wharves, grocery stores, construction sites, provincial government offices, liquor stores, federal government offices, post offices—every workplace with a union was closed from midnight Thursday to midnight Friday. The press condemned the solidarity action, but despite these criticisms the Federation announced that a second solidarity action would take place on March 20 in the East Kootenays, an important resource center for mining and forestry (Vancouver Sun 1981d).

On March 14, the union and company agreed to a back-to-work agreement. Subject to membership ratification of the contract, all employees were to return to work on March 23. The evening before the return to work, a sole arbitrator was to submit a binding interim decision on the twenty-four fired workers; he had the power to recommend suspension of any or all of them. Those suspended would report to work on the morning of March 23 but would leave immediately, although they would collect their full salary pending the final outcome of the arbitration (Hope 1981).¹⁵⁵ During the following week the union held ratification meetings around the province. On March 20, the contract was adopted and the following day the agreement was signed. The BC Federation of Labour postponed indefinitely its second one-day strike.

With the return to work of the telephone workers, the arbitrator, Allan Hope, brought down his interim decision that ten employees were to be temporarily suspended. A little over a week later, in his final report, he ordered full reinstatement of these suspended employees, arguing that the strike had been free of violence. With ten thousand workers on strike, he argued, “the mathematics of the dispute indicated that there were hundreds of confrontations daily between union members and supervisors.” “I can say,” he continued, “that there was not so much as a bloody nose in those hundreds of individual confrontations that took place.” BC Telephone immediately announced that it would appeal the “binding decision” to the Supreme Court of British Columbia.¹⁵⁶ After a confrontation lasting 536 days, including a four-month selective strike, a seven-day occupation in Nanaimo, a five-day province-wide occupation of telephone exchanges, a one-day general strike in Nanaimo, the intervention of the federal labor minister, the provincial labor minister, the provincial leaders of the opposition, and half a dozen mediators, the telephone workers had concluded another collective agreement.