As the train workers’ union dukes it out with Canada’s rail duopoly, watch who quietly sits on the sidelines, refusing to touch the levers that can solve the problem: the federal government.

The problem, as it stands, is this. Canadian National Railway (CN) and Canadian Pacific Kansas City (CPKC) have been working on a new collective agreement with Teamsters Canada Rail Conference, representative of some 9,300 rail workers across the country — for months. Negotiations have gone nowhere and each side has accused the other of bad faith. A resolution is nowhere in sight.