BY KEITH LACEY
The company and union involved in the labour dispute at Inco Ltd.?s Sudbury operations are hoping ?informal talks? will continue within the next day or so.
Four days of informal talks took place last week at a downtown Sudbury hotel with the bargaining committee of Local 6500 of the United Steelworkers of America and Inco?s negotiating team. Both sides said they hoped these talks could lead to a return to the bargaining table.
On the advice of a provincial mediator, these talks were halted over the Civic Holiday long weekend.
Inco spokesperson Cory McPhee and Local 6500 president John Fera agreed last week?s talks didn?t accomplish a lot. However, both men also agree even informal discussion is better than no discussion at all.
?The provincially-appointed mediator thought it would be a good idea to take a break for a few days over the holiday long weekend and everyone on both sides agreed,? said McPhee. ?That being said, the company remains hopeful those same exploratory talks started last week can resume some time this week.?
Fera described last week?s informal discussions as ?extremely frustrating,? but he also held out hope both sides can continue to meet informally over the next few days.
?We?ve told the company our door is open every day of the week, seven days a week, 24 hours a day,? said Fera.
?But we?re only open to talks if they lead to something and we don?t get jerked around the way we were for four straight days last week.?
McPhee and Fera do agree on one thing: the key stumbling blocks in the dispute continue to be health care benefits for pensioners and seniority and transfer rights for the current 3,300 members of Local 6500.
?The company hasn?t made any improvements since we broke off talks May 31,? said Fera. ?They?re simply not open to any of our suggestions?there won?t be any meaningful discussions until the health care benefits issue is dealt with.?
McPhee said the union has to understand the company can no longer afford to pay out huge health-care benefits the way it has in the past.
The company is not trying to eliminate health-care benefits for pensioners or the current workforce, but trying to implement policies to control costs now and in the future, he said.
The company has presented a written promise there will be no reduction in benefits, said McPhee.
?But it will not surrender the long-held right to provide the most cost-effective benefits package possible,? he said.
Drug-care costs have skyrocketed by close to 20 per cent for large employers in the past couple of years, but Inco has managed to keep the increase to around seven per cent, said McPhee.
?Our costs are still going up dramatically, but we must continue to be able to control those costs now and in the future,? he said.
Most of the maintenance conducted at the Copper Cliff smelter and other mines and plants has been finished, said McPhee.
Any suggestion the company planned this strike in order to complete scheduled maintenance at the smelter and other mines and plants is simply unwarranted, said McPhee.
?We?re losing huge amounts of money every week this strike drags on,? he said. ?It was never our intention to force a strike so we could engage in maintenance work.?
Despite the fact the strike has entered its third month, morale and camaraderie among the membership remains strong, said Fera.
?Our guys are in excellent spirits,? he said. ?We all know we?re on the right side of the issues in this dispute.
?The membership is simply not willing to give up on their parents and grandparents and on themselves to ensure health care benefits are taken away,? he said.
Community support is also appreciated by the membership and has been a big reason morale has remained so
high, he said.
Inco?s negotiating team remains in a downtown hotel and is hoping the informal talks can lead to the resumption of
a formal return to the bargaining table in the near future, said McPhee.
