Canada rail strike: Concern over CN, CPKC job action hitting fever pitch in Saskatchewan [Video]

Concern over a potential rail strike is hitting a fever pitch in Saskatchewan.

With only nine days left to avoid a historic disruption to the Canadian economy, business leaders and politicians are running out of options.

“It’s hard to overstate it, and it’s actually hard to imagine a more consequential labor disruption that Canada could actually ever face,” Greg Northey, the vice president of corporate affairs with Pulse Canada, said Tuesday.

“If you have both railways not functioning, quite frankly, nothing will move.”

Pulse Canada represents thousands of Canadian producers, and exports and sells their crops abroad. Northey says if a strike or lockout happens, it will affect nearly everything in the economy.

Both CN Rail and CPKC have said they will lock out employees — thousands of conductors, engineers and railyard workers — on Aug. 22 if a deal can’t be reached.

Both sides have been negotiating for months …