OTTAWA — About 3,000 locomotive engineers and conductors at the Canadian Pacific Railway walked off the job early Sunday morning in a dispute over wages and benefits.
Although the company said it would try to maintain some service by using managers, the strike is likely to disrupt key industries throughout North America, including automakers, oil companies, papermakers, lumber suppliers and agriculture and mining companies.
In a news release issued immediately before the strike, the Teamsters Canada Rail Conference suggested that disagreements on rest time and other scheduling issues had led to the breakdown in negotiations.
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The Canadian government, which has clashed with Canadian Pacific over delays in grain shipments apparently caused by the growth in its oil shipping business, introduced legislation that ended a 2012 strike after nine days. It is expected that it may introduce a bill to end this strike as soon as Parliament convenes on Monday.
On Friday, Kellie Leitch, the federal labor minister, joined in the labor talks, which were held in Montreal.
