When strikers impede traffic by walking in front of cars, stopping them and trying to intimidate them, they are breaking the law. I challenge anyone to show me a statute that gives strikers the legal right to set up road blocks on public thoroughfares. The Labour Relations Act allows unionized workers to strike. It says nothing about allowing strikers to jump in front of vehicles, sometimes kicking them, and putting people's safety at risk. I could never understand the latitude given to strikers on picket lines.
Cops round up bands of squeegee kids plying their trade in Osborne Village.
But they allow strikers to take over street corners and disrupt traffic. The hypocrisy is that unions are the first to stand up and demand employers abide by the law when it comes to following labour legislation. But out on the picket line, it's a different story. Suddenly it's OK to break the law. And that lawlessness often extends beyond illegal road blocks and street intimidation.