Office workers at Notre-Dame-des-Neiges Cemetery returning to work in January after ratifying new contract

Notre-Dame-des-Neiges Cemetery. (THE CANADIAN PRESS/Graham Hughes)

Administrative staff at Montreal's Notre-Dame-des-Neiges Cemetery have voted unanimously in favour of a new collective agreement and are set to go back to work in the New Year, putting an end to a strike that started more than a year ago.

Although maintenance workers returned to work in the fall after striking, the administrative staff were still picketing outside the gates of Canada's largest cemetery, which affected operations. The office workers had been on strike since Sept. 20, 2022.

The newly-ratified agreement includes, among other things, a wage increase of 22.4 per cent covering the years 2018 to 2026.

"The goal was to get the best possible contract for our members, and that's what we got," said Éric Dufault, president of the office workers' union, the Fédération des employées et employés de services publics-CSN (FEESP-CSN), in a news release.

"After such long months on the outside, we'll be going back to work with our heads held high. We will finally be able to welcome the bereaved families who deserve to be treated with the utmost humanity. I'm delighted with the mobilization of our team. I thank all our comrades from the bottom of my heart for the battle they waged."

After 15 months of labour action, the 15 workers are set to return to work on Jan. 9, 2024. They had been without a contract since 2017.

CSN President Caroline Senneville called the strike "a battle that will go down in the history of the Quebec labour movement."

Quebec's labour minister intervened in the bitter labour dispute — one that kept the doors of the cemetery shut for several months, angering families and creating a backlog of burials. They were relieved when the cemetery finally opened again to the public on Sept. 11.