Strike by ILWU over manning and automation disrupts finished vehicle imports at Canadian port of Vancouver

The lockout began at 08.00 on November 4. The Vancouver Frasier Port Authority said the dispute, which is in part about manning and automation, will impact at BCMEA member terminals, where 730 members of the ILWU and Dock Foremen Local 514 are employed.

A record of almost 250,000 vehicles were handled by the port’s auto terminals in the first half of 2024, which includes the Annacis Auto Terminal where an optimisation project by the port authority and Wilhelmsen Port Services has helped increase capacity by more than one-third. Wallenius Wilhelmsen Solutions moves vehicles through the terminal and has been working with the port authority to consolidate automobile operations at the expanded Annacis terminal and repurpose the Richard Auto Terminal.

Nearly 100% of Canada’s Asian-manufactured vehicle imports come through the port of Vancouver.

The port authority said that there is currently limited anchorage capacity at the port because of the elevated seasonal demand in the bulk sector, with grain exports at their peak period. Grain and cruise operations, along with operations at the Westshore coal terminal are expected to continue.

“We are working closely with the industry to optimise anchorage utilisation to ensure port fluidity by prioritising anchorage assignments to terminals that remain operational,” said the port authority in a statement. “We are also working with federal partner agencies to proactively manage vessel traffic impacted by the labour disruption, the port’s anchorage availability and expected inclement weather.”

Everstream Analytics noted midweek that vessels were not diverting from the port and, similar to last month’s US East and Gulf coast port strike, most vessels are still waiting to see how long the lockout will last and not diverting to other ports on the US west coast. That has led to an increase in the number of vessels waiting outside of the port.

The contract between the BCMEA and the ILWU and Dock Foremen 514 expired on March 31, 2023 and the two sides have been in negotiations over manning and automation.

“Our members have repeatedly tried since the contract expired on March 31, 2023 to bargain a new contract without any job action but the BCMEA employers have refused to move and now want to create a crisis instead of negotiating,” said ILWU Local 514 president Frank Morena.

In a statement the BCMEA said the only reason there is a labour disruption down west coast Canadian ports is because Morena initiated the industry-wide strike action effective 08.00 on November 4. “The BCMEA is asking ILWU Local 514 leadership to sign a similar agreement that their Longshore counterparts agreed to after a prolonged dispute in July 2023. Many of the issues the union leadership claims are in contention were effectively solved with the Longshore agreement.”

Strikes are also taking place on the east coast of Canada, at Montreal port’s Termont container terminals, which accounting for 40% of its container traffic but have been blocked since October 31. That dispute also involves union response to the increase in automation.

“More than 1,000 members of ILA Local 1657 […] would see their jobs disappear if Montreal Gateway Terminals and Termont Terminals implement plans to install optical character recognition hardware on all ship-to-shore gantry cranes, top end and reach stackers,” said the International Longshoreman’s Association president Harold Daggett.

Everstream Analytics reported that the Canadian government has not made any direct intervention in the Montreal strike but has proposed federally mediated talks and a 90-day cooling-off period.

“These proposals were rejected by the union and the strikes immediately led to delays and congestion at the port. Following the three-day strike from September 30 to October 3, nearly 14,000 containers were reportedly affected and suffered delays in processing,” said the analyst firm.