Forseth, the MP for New Westminster-Coquitlam, on Tuesday said he isn't taking sides, but believes Telus and the Telecommunications Workers Union are so entrenched that the six-week-old dispute has reached a point where federal Labour Minister Joe Fontana should get involved.

In a news release, Forseth said Fontana could invoke a section of the federal labour code to stop Telus from using replacement workers.

Forseth also wants Fontana to use his power under the federal code to ask the federal cabinet to appoint a judge for an industrial inquiry commission to look into the dispute.

"At some point, that's why the law is there, for the larger public interest," Forseth said in an interview Tuesday.

"It's not only the workers, but it's the shareholders and consumers of the service. It's in all our interest to use the available escape hatch, or relief valve [of the labour code] when we get into these unusual circumstances."

Forseth said an industrial inquiry commission could sort through Telus and the TWU's competing claims and "get to the truth" of the matter.

Drew McArthur, Telus' vice-president of corporate affairs, said the company has hired between 10 and 20 private contractors from outside the province through companies with which Telus has an existing relationship.

McArthur said that under the federal labour code a company is allowed to hire replacement workers "if it is not an attempt to undermine the union." He contends Telus is not attempting to undermine the union, it is just attempting to catch up with the backlog of customer work.

McArthur added that he isn't sure what an industrial inquiry commission would achieve "that we haven't tried to do in the last five years through negotiations with the help of federal mediators in 200 meetings . . . going through point by point by point."

He added if Forseth had read Telus' final offer to TWU's 13,700 members in B.C. and Alberta, "he would realize what the TWU has done is take members out on strike" despite getting the best offer in the industry.

McArthur said the Telus offer includes the highest wages for telecommunications workers in Canada and offers better job protection measures than Bell Canada Enterprise clerical workers recently accepted and U.S. telecommunications firm Qwest negotiated in a deal that is going to ratification.

He added that the job flexibility provisions in the Telus offer are similar to those that the TWU already has with its main western competitor, Shaw Communications Inc.

Sid Shniad, research director for the TWU, said Telus's proposed language on job protection is still "a significant downgrade of existing job protection," and the union still believes it will "open the floodgates" for the contracting out of jobs, despite Telus' commitment that no union member will lose employment.

Shniad added that Telus has never "been explicit about what it is in the existing [language] that they find so untenable."

Shniad said that the union believes that Telus is using a far higher number of replacement workers throughout the province. He said TWU officials have heard anecdotally that Telus has tried to get as many as 30 outside contractors into Nanaimo alone.

The Telus dispute played a role in fixing service to Gabriola Island, which was knocked out at about 6:30 p.m. Thursday.

McArthur said TWU pickets prevented Telus trucks from boarding ferries to the island, intimidated a barge operator from carrying the vehicles and that union vice-president Peter Massy refused to have the pickets stand aside so the equipment could get across.

McArthur added that the company did find a way to get the repair work done, though he declined to say how, but that the union acted "in complete disregard for public safety."

Shniad, however, said the union offered to make its members available to do the emergency repair work on Gabriola Island, but the company turned them down.

"Rather than have the job done, [Telus] wanted to make it their No. 1 priority to make sure it was non-union people doing it."

The Communication Energy and Paperworkers Local 2000, the union that represents workers at Pacific Newspaper Group, which publishes The Vancouver Sun and Province, stepped into the dispute Tuesday by saying its members will refuse to handle Telus advertising.

CEP Local 2000 president Mike Bocking said the decision was in response to the B.C. Federation of Labour placing a so-called "hot edict" on Telus, and is part of the federation's campaign to put pressure on Telus to negotiate with the TWU.

Jamie Pitblado, director of marketing and communications for Pacific Newspaper Group, said the company is disappointed that it has been drawn into the Telus dispute and has filed a grievance with the CEP seeking to stop the edict.

Pitblado said Telus does not have any advertising booked for The Sun or Province, but PNG will "continue to work under business-as-usual-practices."

"If Telus should desire to place some advertising with us, we will accept that advertising."