The NBA pre-season started this week, with replacement referees in control instead of the unionized professional refs, who have been locked out by the NBA. The lockout is lawful under the NLRA (American labor law), but I have not yet seen any evidence that the parties complied with Ontario labour law. As I noted a while back, Ontario law prevents an employer from locking out workers until the parties have passed through a series of procedural hurdles, including government conciliation and a ‘waiting period’ after the government announces it will not require any further conciliation.
The Raptors are playing Philadelphia this Tuesday in London, Ontario and Wednesday in Toronto. Will replacement refs be there? No one is talking. The NBA Refs union website says hardly anything about the lockout. But the OLRB has already clearly ruled on this situation in prior cases involving both NBA refs and baseball umpires. The professional leagues must comply with Ontario lockout laws if they want to lockout unionized refs in Ontario. So let’s see if the Ref’s union does anything about this before this week’s game.
