Updated: Why we are voting NO!

Our analysis:

  1. a longer article from the folks at Humber describing just how much of a set back this latest offer is
  2. our own Noor Kabani's analysis.
  3. a comparison of the CEC's  final offer with ours.

 

The following summarizes some of the main points.

  • The current offer on the table is nearly identical to the bad offer that forced us into a strike position five weeks ago.

  • The offer you will vote on is NOT the “almost there” deal your bargaining team were negotiating over a week ago - we are NOT one issue away.

  • Any negotiated items that are included in the final offer have been undermined by the additional concessions Council tabled last Monday.

  • The CEC has basically moved back to their original position.

  • The offer we vote on is management's November 6th offer and it will set us back.

The strike will be over soon, regardless of how we vote. We know you want to be back in your classrooms, libraries, and counselling sessions: let it be on our terms.

The CEC and college management are not being truthful when they say there are no concessions. This offer has many concessions, which member Noor Kabani has pointed out in her line by line analysis available here.

The offer we are voting on will:

1. Threaten existing partial load positions, and allow the CEC to get away with adding very few full-time jobs.

2. Allow for unlimited back-to-back sessional appointments without a requirement to transform them into full time jobs.

3. Avoid the equal work for equal pay provisions of Bill 148.

4.  Heavily pressure full-time faculty into unlimited overtime instead of creating more opportunities for contract professors.

5. Provide inadequate academic freedom provisions.

6.  Create awful return-to-work protocols that will not fairly compensate faculty for the work involved, and that will replicate the problems that arose following the 2006 strike.

Let’s expand on that last issue. In the offer the clause is written as follows:

The reduction in the annual salary for a full-time bargaining unit member will be 1/216 of the annual salary for each working day of the work stoppage. Time specified on a SWF covering the work stoppage period shall not be treated as having been worked for the purpose of Article 11.

Technically we work 261 days in a year and thus the reduction 1/216 is incorrect. Council’s reduction of our salary is therefore significantly larger than if the correct fraction 1/261 is used.

This does not appear to be a typo (and even if it is a typo it would remain binding if we vote to accept this deal). We believe this act is deliberate.

If we accept the offer it means we are willingly accepting a pay reduction for the work we will be required to complete when we return:

  • We will deducted 1/216 per day (231.48 per day for a person making 50k per year) rather than 1/261 (191.57 per day for a person making 50k per year).

  • The difference is roughly $40 per day for a full time faculty making 50k per year ($200 per week - i.e. about $1000 so far).

Rejecting this offer allows our bargaining team to return to the table to negotiate a deal that meaningfully addresses faculty concerns. Remember, if Council loses this vote, they lose their leverage. Rejecting this offer sends Council the clear message that their vision for the system - one built on precarious workers with no say in their classrooms, counselling sessions, or libraries - is not the vision that faculty or students want.

Taras Gula