After lengthy negotiations and multiple transit strikes, maintenance workers for the Société de transport de Montréal have ratified a new five-year collective agreement.
On Sunday, STM employees voted 86 per cent in favour of a proposal put forward by a mediator, ending a more than two-year impasse between the transit agency and the union representing its workers, the Confédération des syndicats nationaux (CSN). The STM’s board of directors also approved the deal.
Since last June, the STM’s 2,400 maintenance workers have held four limited strikes. The first three strikes — in June, September and November — cut all bus and métro service outside morning and afternoon rush hours and the late-night shift.
Terms of the new agreement include a 17.5 per cent wage increase over five years for trades workers, and a 16 per cent increase for support staff, along with improvements to the banked overtime system and the grievance and arbitration process, according to a statement from the CSN. The mediator submitted their recommendations on March 24, one month after maintenance workers threatened a fifth strike.
“These negotiations were anything but easy,” the union’s statement quoted president Bruno Jeanotte as saying, adding they had to fight against the government’s disinterest in public transit throughout the negotiations. The union also says it curbed most of the STM’s demands for concessions, particularly about subcontracting to non-STM workers for maintenance.
According to CSN president Caroline Senneville, the Coalition Avenir Québec government is largely to blame for the drawn-out negotiations, after promising to use new back-to-work legislation if the workers went on another strike.
“By threatening to use Bill 14, it invited the STM to sit on its hands rather than negotiate with the union,” the statement quoted Senneville as saying.
This is the fourth collective agreement adopted in recent months for STM employees, according to a statement from the transit agency, after deals with unions representing administrative staff, professionals, and bus drivers, métro operators and station agents.
“I am very pleased that the members have ratified the agreement,” a statement from CEO Marie-Claude Léonard said. “We chose to prioritize a negotiated settlement, which is always preferable for maintaining positive labour relations. I commend the joint efforts of both parties to respect the financial framework through compromises on all sides.”
Unions for security personnel and office clerks have been without a contract since January. “In both cases, negotiations began in 2025 and discussions are ongoing,” the STM says.
Editor’s Picks