STRONGFIELD—A strike by 4,800 Canadian Pacific Railway (CP) employees is delaying grain shipments including those from Gardiner Dam Terminal (GDT) in Strongfield.

CP Rail locomotive engineers, conductors, yardmen and rail traffic controllers who are members of the Teamsters Canada Rail Conference, went on strike early Wednesday morning. The strike shut down all CP Rail freight traffic. The major issues are work rules, fatigue management and the pension plan, which the Teamsters say the employer wants to cut by 40 per cent.

“We just loaded 112 cars and they are still sitting on our tracks,” Shawn Graham, GDT’s general manager, said Thursday. He said if the strike drags on, the company would seek ways to minimize impacts on local grain deliveries.

He’s hopeful CP and the union will resolve their differences through mediation.

If not federal Labour Minister Lisa Raitt announced plans to table back-to-work legislation when the House of Commons resumes sitting today.

The Canadian Wheat Board estimates the strike will delay 162,000 metric tonnes of wheat and barley sold to its buyers.

Once CP Rail freight is back up and running, there will be a backlog to clear up.

“Anything loaded or in transit doesn’t get moved,” Graham said.

The backlog costs shippers such as GDT money due to demurrage charges from shipping companies and ports.

As long as the work stoppage isn’t too lengthy, GDT should able to weather the delay, Graham said.

With seeding going on, and the strong freight service GDT has received from CP the past few months there is storage capacity at the terminal.