Court Issues Injunction Against Union Picketers on Safety Grounds

An employer and union were in a labour dispute, with union members picketing the workplace. The employer asked a court to issue an injunction against the union based on an escalation of conduct that it believed endangered the health and safety of workers. It specifically claimed that increased delays in crossing the picket line could lead to worker fatigue and result in a safety incident. The court noted that these delays had increased from a few minutes to more than three hours. Concluding that there was evidence of a concern for workers’ health and safety, the court issued an interim injunction, barring the picketers from ‘blocking, hindering, delaying or obstructing’ entry or exit from the facility [Cascade Aeroscape Inc. v. Unifor (Local 114), [2014] BCSC 1211 (CanLII), June 22, 2014].