Sudden strike by over 1,000 hotel workers

More than 1,000 hotel workers staged an impromptu strike in Montreal on Saturday, two days after a national strike mobilized hundreds of employees.

“The employer must face the facts: the only way to avoid strike action and achieve a speedy solution to the labor dispute is to really negotiate. Hotel workers are determined to be respected,” announced in a press release on Saturday, Michel Valicut, head of the hotel sector and treasurer of the Commerce Federation (FC-CSN).

In total, the Confederation des Syndicates Nationaux (SCN) reported that 600 workers at the Queen Elizabeth Hotel, 350 at the Marriott Chateau Champlain and nearly a hundred workers at the Hyatt Place Montreal-Downtown Hotel participated in the strike.

For Queen Elizabeth, it is said to be the third day of strike since Thursday.

“If the managers of these three hotels have not yet accounted for the mobilization of employees, they have no choice but to understand! Today 1000 workers are on strike. That's without counting the support of CSN's 330,000 members! Central Council of Metropolitan Montreal (CCMM-CSN) vice-president Chantal Id.

The employees launched a national strike on August 8 in the middle of the tourist season, saying they were frustrated by the slow pace of negotiations with their employer.