‘Hostile offer’: Canadian Airbus A220 workers reject contract, consider strike mandate

Montreal — Canadian Airbus A220 production workers on Sunday voted to reject a contract and are considering a strike mandate, a union official said, raising labor tensions as the European planemaker tries to reduce the money-losing jet’s costs.

More than 99 per cent of the union members who voted rejected the contract, the union official said.

The estimated 1,300 Montreal-area workers represented by the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers (IAM) in the Canadian province of Quebec, are voting on a strike mandate.

While a mandate does not equate with an actual strike, the vote signals discontent among those who produce Airbus’s smallest commercial jet.

“This offer, that we consider as hostile, cannot be left without consequences,” Montreal-area union negotiators said earlier this month in a French-language letter to members.

The union’s contract expired in December.

Unions have recently capitalized on tight labor markets and inflation to win hefty contracts at the bargaining table, with airline pilots, autoworkers and others scoring big raises in 2023.

Boeing’s unionized production workers in Washington state have called for wage increases exceeding 40 per cent over three to four years.