Tentative Deal Reached to End Long-Running Strike That Has Closed Montreal Cemetery

Jean Boulet, Immigration minister in Quebec City, Nov. 24, 2021. (The Canadian Press/Jacques Boissinot)

Quebec Labour Minister Jean Boulet says a resolution has been reached in the months-long standoff between workers and management at Canada’s largest cemetery.

Boulet said on Twitter today the two sides in the dispute at Montreal’s Notre-Dames-des-Neiges Cemetery have agreed to support the recommendation of the province’s head mediator.

The strike by more than 100 maintenance and office workers has kept the graveyard’s wrought-iron gates shut to the public since mid-January, with the exception of a few days in the spring.

About 300 bodies have gone unburied as a result of the job action, with the remains stored at freezing temperatures in an on-site repository.

Cemetery spokesman Daniel Granger says the closure has been hard on families, who clogged roads leading to the cemetery on Mount Royal when it reopened for six hours on Mother’s Day.

Éric Dufault, president of the office workers’ union, says employees will vote on the proposed agreement Wednesday.