cupe700The president of CUPE 7000 says he doesn’t see any imminent end to the lockout of Southern Railway workers that is now in its 11th week.

Bill Magri says managers have been trying to run the rail service but are struggling.

“They can’t keep up with the work so a lot of it is not getting done. Customers that were enjoying very good service prior to the lockout are receiving sporadic service if any at all. Some of them they just cannot get to. Between 20 and 30 people cannot do the work of 126.”

Magri says the railway serves a lot of agriculture customers in the Fraser Valley and says a lot of the customers are not getting the grain shipments they need.

He says not only have the mangers not been able to keep up the levels of service, they’ve also had problems with safety procedures.

“Early on in the lockout there were issues with headlights not being illuminated going through a public crossing, brakes locked on a train, stuff like that. They have been documented and passed on to the BC Safety Authority.”

We contacted Southern Railway but they declined the opportunity to comment.