Driving Instructors Rally At Queen’s Park, Want Provincial DriveTest Centres To Reopen

Three months after DriveTest employees walked off the job, driving instructors are holding a rally at Queen’s Park.

“It’s affecting us very badly,” said one woman at the protest. She has been a driving instructor for 27 years.

“About 10,000 instructors in Ontario are financially very hard hit. We have no work. We are educators; we are supposed to be teaching.”

The strike began on August 21, preventing new motorists from acquiring a license.

“Most Ontarians are not even aware that the strike has stretched for 100 days,” the instructor added.

That put hundreds of people who teach driving out of a job and on Monday, they took their protest to the Ontario government.

The instructors have at least one ally: Progressive Conservative MPP Jim Wilson introduced a private members bill last week that would force 600 employees back to work.

The legislation, called the DriveTest Labour Dispute Resolution Act, 2009 would force DriveTest operator, Serco DES Inc., and the United Steelworkers Local 9511 to resolve their dispute through binding arbitration.

Liberal and NDP MPPs abstained from voting.

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