Montreal school bus drivers vote in favour of new five year contract

File Photo (Photo: Kurt Bauschardt/Flickr)

MONTREAL — School bus drivers with Montreal’s Autobus Transco have voted in favour of a tentative contract agreement reached on March 6.

The Transco-CSN union members voted 81 per cent to accept the deal after rejecting an earlier agreement reached at the end of January by a similar margin.

That vote had followed a two-day strike by about 300 drivers.

The union says the five-year deal includes wage increases of 1.4 per cent retroactive to July 1, 2017, plus a 1.6 per cent increase on July 1, another two per cent in July 2019 and three per cent in each of the final two years of the contract.

Transco buses take roughly 15,000 elementary and high school students to and from four major public school boards in Montreal as well one private school.