Tuesday, January 27, 2009

Religious leaders speak out against strike

A joint rally of Ottawa's Christian and Jewish community leaders yesterday came out with one message: This strike is affecting the city's most vulnerable people, and needs to end. As reported in the Ottawa Metro:

At a rally in front of city hall, top officials from Ottawa’s Jewish and Christian communities signed letters to the mayor and the OC Transpo drivers union urging them to end the 49-day-old strike and get the buses rolling as soon as possible.

“It’s become an ethical issue,” said Anglican Bishop John Chapman. “Too many of the marginalized people, like the elderly and the very young are being hurt.”

Rabbi Arnold Fine with Congregation Beth Shalom said they were not taking sides in the dispute. They just want everyone to get back to work.

“Getting back to work refers not only to drivers, but also to city hall,” he said. “We need to get back together so this community can go forward. So those people who are suffering can get back to the things they should be doing.”

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

“It’s become an ethical issue,” said Anglican Bishop John Chapman. “Too many of the marginalized people, like the elderly and the very young are being hurt.”


It started as an ethical issue. In addition to being able to break Federal Safety Standards, the drivers were allowed to schedule their own hours and shifts.

If the drivers had any ethics to begin with, they wouldn't routinely create unsafe conditions. Nor would they routinely schedule their shifts in attempts to essentially steal between 20K and 50K each extra a year.

Anonymous said...

In fact, I suspect what the new bargaining position for the city will ultimately be is to agree to the unions having some control opver the scheduling.

Then you pass laws to make sure that federal safety standards are met, and that scheduling that violates that is unacceptable

Further, you pass laws that public servants who conspire to steal extra wages through abuse of e.g. scheduling rights can be fired, arrested and jailed, as well as forfeiting all proceeds from such crimes.

In effect, you need to legislate ethics on what is essentially a bunch of scum sucking lowlifes that don't like, or don't agree with the notion of an honest hour's pay for an honest hour's work.