Sisters and Brothers,
In the summer, you signed onto a national petition demanding federal funding for public transit. Thanks to your support and the demands from workers and riders across the country, the federal government created a historic transit funding model with the provinces as part of the Safe Restart Agreement.
The emergency funding was much appreciated and very necessary. However, now that the second wave of COVID-19 is here (and expected to be even bigger than the first) we need to work to protect our public transit agencies for the future. Across the country, transit agencies are on the brink of collapsing or being forced to cut or eliminate service routes and jobs because of the impacts of COVID-19, and following decades of neglect, cuts, and privatization.
ATU Canada has partnered with community organizations across the country to urge the government to prioritize transit operating funds in the Fall Economic Statement. That means committing $400 million per month in ongoing funding for transit operations to recover the financial losses incurred during the pandemic.
Will you join us and add your voice to dozens of organizations and thousands of people demanding ongoing, operational funding for public transit?
Sign your name onto The Council of Canadians’ letter to the federal government.
We can’t afford to lose our public transit systems to the pandemic. Public health and our climate depend on it.
In solidarity,
John Di Nino
ATU Canada President