The parties involved in the Metro Transit strike are back at the bargaining table for the first time since the strike began, but the president of the Amalgamated Transit Union says talks are going "lousy."
The union and the city met behind closed doors in Dartmouth around 10:30 a.m. Wednesday.
Both the union and Metro Transit released new proposals this morning but the details of those proposals have not been released.
After two hours of negotiating both sides parted ways and the union reviewed the new offer behind closed doors for four hours Wednesday afternoon.
Talks resumed between the two parties around 4:30 p.m. but broke off again around 6 p.m. so they could re-group in separate rooms to discuss their options.
They are expected to head back to the bargaining table Wednesday night.
About 750 Metro Transit employees parked their buses and ferries and hit the picket lines on February 2, which has left transit users across HRM scrambling to find alternative transportation.
The workers have been without a contract since September 1. A conciliator was brought to the table in November to help broker a deal, but talks between the city and the union broke off.
While the parties have reached an agreement on some concessions, the main issue in the dispute seems to be a scheduling arrangement called rostering, which allows senior drivers to pick their own shifts.
The city called union officials back to the table late last Wednesday to discuss shift scheduling and a wage increase and it presented two offers at that time.
One offer included a six per cent wage increase over three years and a rostering system that would assign weekly blocks of work, instead of allowing bus drivers to choose individual shifts based on their seniority.
The other proposal was for a 3.5 per cent wage increase combined with a scheduling system preferred by the union, said the city.
"Disappointing," said Mayor Peter Kelly last week of the union's decision to walk away from the offer. "We thought we were being able to offer some very strong options for the union…and the choice was theirs."
But union president Ken Wilson said it just wasn't enough and the city hasn't been willing to negotiate fairly from the beginning.
"This is nothing but smoke and mirrors and doing what this employer always does," said Wilson. "I've said it before and I'll say it again. This employer treats the public like trash, the same way they threat us. If we did this to the public we'd be fired."
Workers walked off the job shortly after the union turned down the offer last Thursday.
There are roughly 96,000 daily trips made on Metro Transit buses and ferries each day.
The last time the city experienced a transit strike was in 1998.
With files from CTV Atlantic's Kelland Sundahl
