In early 1988, I knew nothing about trade unions. Nobody in my family had ever belonged to one. My only salaried positions had been in a psychology department, and five independent schools, so union dues were not something I’d ever been obliged to pay.
Unions had only previously affected my privileged existence when strikes stopped services like mail delivery, garbage collection, and airline flights.
When publicizing impending walkouts, journalists disseminate anxiety overnight. When socialized medicine began in Quebec on Nov 1st, 1970, all specialist physicians went on strike. Due to deliver my first baby a week later, I was distressed when my final checkup was done by a total stranger.
Starting Strike Duty
Finding labour stoppages to be a nuisance, I never considered their purpose or what working conditions members found unendurable enough to walk out. All that changed on June 21st, 1988, when the operators’ and technicians’ union (now Unifor) at Bell Canada went on strike at 12 noon.
Joining Bell the previous August, I was Staff Manager in the Bell Institute of Professional Development. I delivered Information Mapping™ courses to Bell employees across Canada and external customers. I’d found my niche and felt my expertise grow with every session. Teaching highly motivated adults how to effectively write policies and procedures was a refreshing change from teaching mathematics and physics to easily distracted teenaged girls.
Weeks beforehand, there were rumblings around the office of a possible strike. When union/management bargaining finally broke down, my courses were cancelled, and I was summoned to strike duty. I’d work as a Bell operator six days a week, for ten-hour shifts, with irregular start-times varying from 6 am to 2 pm. I’d report to Bell Trinity Square near the downtown Eaton Centre. Each day I would have two 15-minute coffee breaks, and one 30-minute lunch break – a sea change from my comfortably flexible routine.
Hearing that all management vacations were cancelled, I pictured the bleak summer that lay ahead, with no idea when the strike would end. The previous October we’d bought a cottage on Lake Ontario, near Brighton. My thoughts swirled: This is our first summer. I’ll never be able to join my family there. No tennis, swimming, or entertaining. So unfair! Today, the label “first world problems” fits these concerns, I’m quick to admit.
Do you remember the way a voice would answer “Operator” whenever you dialed 0 in the 1980s? I became such a voice. I received five days of operator training at a computer terminal with green letters flashing against a black screen. Standard training for new operators took three months, but my competencies developed in baby steps. Starting with simple collect calls, we slowly built to full capacity while on-the-job.
Reporting for duty downtown, I avoided eye contact with strikers on the picket line, reached the office at 8 am, and logged on. To be honest, it was rather exciting at first, having never before interacted with the public. It was fun to put a call through for someone whose quarter had gotten stuck in the pay phone slot. Little kids who’d lost their money had to call home. To maintain good public relations, we accepted virtually any excuse.
New Routine
Fifteen minutes is an appallingly short time to use the washroom and grab something to eat, so I became efficient. Food delivered by Druxy’s looked appealing at the start, but I soon tired of muffins, potato salad, and cold cuts. Putting on weight with all this inactivity, I’d stumble towards the snacks vowing to ignore the chocolate chip cookies and fail every time.
The repetitious work was stultifying, so I absorbed interesting call details to share with my family. Many collect calls were made by prisoners to loved ones. I’d ask, “Whom shall I say is calling?” and get answers like “Meat” and “Big boy.”
A young woman sought my help to reach a man in Bogota, Colombia. “He was here in April, and we had an amazing romance. Now I’ve found out I’m pregnant.” Yikes. When I finally connected the caller with her boyfriend, it took willpower to not eavesdrop.
Each operator logs onto the system with a unique ID. This permits constant monitoring of their work – calculating the number of calls handled during their shift and average seconds per call. Being a substitute, my work wasn’t measured the same way – at least I was given no feedback.
As the ten-hour days ticked by, I became sympathetic to the strikers’ goals which I’d read were more pay, job security, and better working conditions. I felt like a hamster running on a wheel inside a cage. No room for creativity, innovation, or unscheduled downtime. No chance to take a breath or recover from an emotional call.
Spending unbroken hours sitting or standing facing a monitor in a cubicle wearing a headset is physically demanding. Constant variation in shift times affected my sleep. I caught a cold. I’ve read that those working night-shifts suffer a higher incidence of cancer.
The most difficult shift was 2 pm to 12 midnight because incoming calls slowed to a crawl and boredom set it. I tried keeping a paperback to read, but disjointed reading did nothing.
When the July 1st holiday weekend arrived, my teenaged sons and husband tootled off to our lakeside retreat without me and later tried to be inexplicit about the glorious time they had.
Changing Offices
After four weeks of six-days-a-week strike duty, my stoicism had shattered. One lunch break I popped into the Church of the Holy Trinity and sought divine guidance, and it arrived in spades.
My thinking: The strike affects all Bell operators in Ontario. Our cottage is only 40 minutes’ drive west of Belleville. I will ask to be transferred to that switching office! I can swim, enjoy summer pursuits with the family, and still do this onerous job. The commute will be fun and shorter than in the city. My manager agreed.
After using my single day-off to pack up and move to the cottage, my first drive to Belleville was blessed with sunshine. Walking across the dewy lawn to the car at 7 am accompanied by birdsong was a treat. The Belleville picketers yelling at me as I entered the Bell building – not so much.
Belleville was fantastic: easy drive, small office with only six operators, full kitchen with homemade-style refreshments. Enjoying roast dinners with gravy, veggies, and desserts felt like being in a sorority house.
Over the summer, my Trenton-based mother-in-law’s health was in decline. She’d suffered multiple myeloma for years and had again been admitted to Kingston General Hospital. Three weeks after I started working at Belleville she died. Hearing this sad fact, the manager said, “Take seven days to be with family and attend the funeral.”
Calling her the night before my return, she said, “Actually, you do not need to ever come back here. Just report to your regular Toronto office.”
“Why on earth?” Can she hear my happiness through the phone? I wondered, smiling broadly.
“Somehow word got around to the union that you were working here. They call you a scab because you are a Staff Manager on probation. It takes a full year for your management status to be confirmed and you only joined Bell on August 4, 1987.”
I tried to sound dismayed and then headed off to jump in the lake.
Millions Have No Choice
Looking back on that summer, I realize that millions of people must do shift work. They accept the confines of staying in one place and endlessly repeating the same function to feed their families. On the plus side they don’t have to “take their work home with them” the way managers and small business owners do. But now they have my sympathy.
The strike ended in October. Having walked in an operator’s shoes, my opinion of unions has changed. Whatever concessions the Bell union won they deserved. I now tip waitstaff more generously, boycott stores whose staff are on strike, and honk at picketers to show my support.
The most effective way for unions to spotlight the services they provide is to take them away.