{"id":123680,"date":"2025-09-06T06:48:11","date_gmt":"2025-09-06T06:48:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/123680\/"},"modified":"2025-09-06T06:48:11","modified_gmt":"2025-09-06T06:48:11","slug":"pickets-come-down-at-icbc-office-but-bcgeu-vows-to-ratchet-up-strike","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/123680\/","title":{"rendered":"Pickets come down at ICBC office, but BCGEU vows to ratchet up strike"},"content":{"rendered":"

Driver licensing services are set to resume at ICBC\u2019s Guildford location in Surrey on Saturday, after multiple days of disruption due to the B.C. General Employees Union (BCGEU) strike.<\/p>\n

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ICBC workers are not members of the BCGEU, but the location was behind one of the striking union\u2019s picket lines.<\/p>\n

The public insurer said Friday it had applied for a \u201ccommon site order\u201d through the Labour<\/a> Relations Board, a measure that bars striking workers from picketing unrelated third-party businesses.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis outcome ensures our employees can continue serving customers at this location despite ongoing picketing by the BC General Employees\u2019 Union (BCGEU) and the Professional Employees\u2019 Association (PEA),\u201d ICBC said.<\/p>\n

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With the exception of the Guildford location, the public impacts of the BCGEU strike, now in its fourth day, have been relatively muted.<\/p>\n

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The union has targeted government buildings in Victoria, Surrey and Prince George, along with the Royal BC Museum.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s predominantly government operations that have been impacted by this strike,\u201d BCGEU president Paul Finch told Global News.<\/p>\n

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\u201cIf government doesn\u2019t come to the table, that will change.\u201d<\/p>\n

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The union is asking for a raise of 8.25 per cent over two years, while the province is offering 3.5 per cent over two years, and says so far the government hasn\u2019t returned with an improved wage offer.<\/p>\n

Barry Eidlin, an associate professor of sociology at McGill University, said the road could get rougher in the days ahead if the two sides remain far apart.<\/p>\n

The union, which has some 34,000 members in the bargaining unit, has deliberately held off on wider work stoppages for strategic reasons, he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhere do you go from there, right? You\u2019ve basically exerted your maximum pressure all at once. And sometimes that can help if you really need a sort of shock and awe approach or something \u2026\u00a0but if it doesn\u2019t work, then you\u2019re stranded,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo I think what the union was thinking was they wanted to have a measured approach and ratchet up the pressure progressively depending on how the employer responded at the bargaining table.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Legally, picket lines can stay up indefinitely, with the Labour Relations Board rarely getting involved.<\/p>\n

The province does have the power to intervene, but it comes with the risk of public backlash.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s a strategy the federal government recently employed in a bid to end Air Canada flight attendants\u2019 strike \u2014 only to see workers defy the order, and ultimately force a deal with the airline.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you\u2019re thinking about legislating workers back to work, the end of a strike, that\u2019s a really extreme outcome,\u201d said Roper Greyell LLP labour lawyer Danny Bernstein.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s highly unlikely, certainly early in the strike.\u201d<\/p>\n

The union is keeping its cards close to the vest in terms of future actions, but the memory is still fresh of the BCGEU\u2019s 2022 strike which saw workers picket Liquor and Cannabis Distribution Branch warehouses, an action that did lead to significant public disruption.<\/p>\n

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The province, meanwhile, is locked in bargaining with numerous large public sector unions, including teachers and nurses, and is seeking to keep labour costs down as it grapples with a $7.3-billion deficit and the ongoing fallout of the trade war with the U.S.<\/p>\n

\u201cGovernment employees did very well in the last round of negotiations, keeping up with and exceeding inflation,\u201d B.C. Premier David Eby said on Friday.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re just not able to do that this time around; we\u2019re facing big fiscal headwinds.\u201d<\/p>\n

It\u2019s an answer that\u2019s unlikely to satisfy the BCGEU, which appears to be settling in for the long haul.<\/p>\n

If that\u2019s the case, Eidlin said the public should be ready for increasing disruption.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe purpose of a strike is to be disruptive. If you\u2019re not disrupting the rhythms of everyday life, you\u2019re not waging an effective strike,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe fact is that a lot of the work that these provincial workers do is fundamental to the day-to-day functioning of British Columbians\u2019 lives.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\n\t\t&copy 2025 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Driver licensing services are set to resume at ICBC\u2019s Guildford location in Surrey on Saturday, after multiple days…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":123681,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[60630,49,48,46,3717,44,714],"class_list":{"0":"post-123680","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-canada","8":"tag-bcgeu-strike","9":"tag-ca","10":"tag-canada","11":"tag-economy","12":"tag-labour","13":"tag-news","14":"tag-politics"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/123680","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=123680"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/123680\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/123681"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=123680"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=123680"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=123680"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}