TTC prepares for possible worker shortage based on COVID vaccination status disclosure

The Toronto Transit Commission (TTC) has told the workers’ union there could potentially be a labour shortage due to its COVID-19 vaccination policy.

The transit agency has said to ATU Local 113 that it won’t know what the final number of vaccinated employees will be as of its deadline on Oct. 30, but it is anticipating that there will be staffing reductions.

Employees were required to disclose their COVID-19 vaccination status by Oct. 6, a date that was pushed back several times, over a dispute with the union who told its members not to disclose their status and called the policy “unlawful.”

“Frankly, if the executive of ATU 113 hadn’t spent weeks misleading our employees by encouraging them to withhold their status, this might not even be an issue, but here we are,” the transit agency said.

So far, 80 per cent of employees have shared their status, the TTC said. Of that, 90 per cent have indicated full vaccination with the rest having had one shot. The TTC said their system does not capture people who are unvaccinated as they are identified by process of elimination.

The TTC sent a letter stating start dates for bus, streetcar and subway sign-ups had to be pushed back and revised to Nov. 3 from late October.

“Out of due diligence we need to envision different scenarios and our service planning process requires a long lead time,” the TTC said.

ATU Local 113 maintains that TTC management did not consult the union on its mandatory vaccination policy or provide adequate information. It also said the TTC did not provide reasonable solutions such as regular testing offered as options by other employers.

“We believe mandating vaccination as a term of employment violates the Collective Agreement, Charter and privacy law,” the union’s president Carlos Santos said in a statement. “We are committed to fighting this issue at grievance arbitration if TTC does not reconsider the policy.”

“TTC workers have already been under enormous amount of stress throughout the pandemic,” Santos continued. “This unnecessary and unlawful policy has only made things worse. Our members want to focus on serving transit riders. Instead, they are having sleepless nights worrying about losing their ability to provide for their families over a health-care choice.”

The transit agency said as for “what happens” on Oct. 30 — for those who are unvaccinated and don’t have a valid exemption — that no decisions have been made but that those employees would be in violation of the policy.