Some striking elevator technicians in the GTA will be forced back to work next week by a rarely used piece of labour law that members worry will divide the union — and won’t restore full service to places such as nursing homes and apartment towers.

Under the Labour Relations Act, trades involved in residential construction may legally strike or be locked out only between May 1 and June 15. Their three-year contracts all end simultaneously on April 30.

Officials with the Ministry of Labour said they have no record of striking tradespeople ever actually being forced back to work under the provision — which applies only to work involved in “constructing, altering, decorating, repairing or demolishing” new and existing residential buildings — in the 13 years since it was put in place.

However, trade unions, including bricklayers, ironworkers, painters and carpenters, have all experienced losing the right to strike when they were still in the process of negotiations as of June 15.

Elevator companies have begun calling workers to come back to work Monday, said Patrick Moran, spokesperson for the National Elevator Escalator Association, which is negotiating for the four major companies involved.

“It will be employees necessary by the company to perform the work under the residential construction provisions of the act,” Moran said.

It’s unclear how many would be called back, but he said it would be a significant number.

Some strikers said calling some workers back will create animosity in the ranks, pitting picketers against those who must cross the picket lines.

“Why is that guy being called back, and I’m not?” one worker said of the scenario that will be forced on them Monday.

More than 800 elevator workers have been on strike since their contracts with the companies — KONE, Otis, Schindler and ThyssenKrupp — expired.

The union and the association are negotiating, and a mediator has been brought in to help end the strike that has gone on since May 1.

Workloads and staffing levels are the main sticking points for the workers, in one of North America’s busiest construction markets. The association says its main sticking point is seniority, which it wants to see changed from an industry-wide system to a company-wide system.

The act allows workers called back to seek a new temporary contract, Moran said.

“Those who are called back can ask the union to seek arbitration and they’d be put in a separate contract until a new agreement is reached for the whole,” he said.

However, it’s possible the workers forced back could remain in their arbitrated contract, dividing the two sets of workers into two different agreements.

Union officials questioned Wednesday whether the legislation even applied to them.

“The elevator companies are trying to use a provision that applies to the residential construction industry that we are not a direct party to,” said International Union of Elevator Constructors Local 50 spokesperson Ben McIntyre.

If a deal isn’t reached by June 15, workers will be sent back to their jobs under the expired contract until a new agreement can be reached. The provision applies only to workers in the GTA and Simcoe County.

McIntyre said the legal provision doesn’t apply to elevators in hospitals, nursing homes and most residential buildings.

“It is a disingenuous effort to create false hope among Ontarians,” he said. “It would only return a small portion of our members to work for rich condo developers in Toronto, while leaving the rest of the province without our services.”

The legislation was amended in 2000 by the Mike Harris Conservative government, in reaction to rolling strikes in the residential construction sector by different trade unions.

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One trade union would wait for a settlement for another striking union, then establish its own demands based on the earlier settlement. If employers refused, another strike would ensue.

In the summer of 1998, a series of six consecutive strikes brought homebuilding in the GTA to a screeching halt, prompting the government to amend the legislation to put a time limit on strikes and lockouts.

The amendment remained a temporary test measure until 2005, when the Dalton McGuinty government made it permanent.