UPEI Community Bulletin: Collective Bargaining Update
The University has not received responses or counter offers to the proposals we made on February 28 and March 10. As a result, the University expects that Monday morning the UPEI Faculty Association (UPEI FA) bargaining committee will commence a labour disruption, meaning that all faculty, librarians, sessional instructors, and clinical nursing instructors will be on strike. This will affect all classes and students across the University.
The University is committed to working hard to try and find a resolution to any strike and to work with our student community to minimize the effects on their studies and student experience. For students and non-UPEI FA Unit 1 employees, the latest updates and FAQs about what will happen tomorrow is available on UPEI’s labour relations website at charlottedreamers.com/labour.
It is unfortunate that collective bargaining has reached this point. It has been an exceptionally difficult round of bargaining and the parties have utilized a number of resources to try and reach an agreement.
Since last April, the bargaining team for the University has met for more than 40 days with the UPEI FA’s team a) face to face; b) with the assistance of a government-appointed conciliator; c) with the assistance of a government-appointed mediator; and d) most recently, face to face once again. In the last two weeks, we engaged with FA directly by email in seeking responses to new proposals, withdrawing proposals, and making new proposals.
Unfortunately, these methods of bargaining have not led to substantial resolution of the outstanding issues.
As the UPEI FA has not made any counter offers, withdrawn proposals, or responded to our proposals since late February to put us on the road to an agreement, we now believe the only means left to reach a collective agreement is to have a neutral third party assist us, e.g., interest arbitration. We are once again calling on the UPEI FA to agree to take all outstanding issues to interest arbitration to avoid the damage of a strike.
Details of all items still in dispute as well as the most up-to-date proposals from each team can be found at charlottedreamers.com/labour.
