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By admin, November 2, 2009 12:51 pm

On May 3, 2009, CUPE 3907 called on Provost Busch-Vishniac to negotiate a fair settlement for Post-Doctoral Fellows. Read the complete letter below:

252 Bloor Street West, Room 8-104
Toronto ON M5S 1V6
(416) 978-2403

Sent by email (hard copy to follow by mail)

May 3, 2009

Dr. Ilene Busch-Vishniac
Provost and Vice-President (Academic)
1280 Main Street West
University Hall, Room 201
Hamilton, Ontario
L8S4L8

Re: Concerns about treatment of PDF at the bargaining table

Dear Dr. Busch-Vishniac:

The members of CUPE local 3907 view McMaster University’s treatment of its
Post-Doctoral Fellows with grave concern for the principles of equity and the
institution’s commitment to developing the professional capacity of all of its
personnel.

McMaster University should be committed to substantive justice in the manner in
which it deals with its different stakeholders. However, this necessary principle
and practice does not appear to extend to Post-Doctoral Fellows. Your
bargaining team has proposed a base yearly full-time salary of $25,000, or about
$13.75 per hour for these academic workers. Beware that this scheme would
place Post-Doctoral Fellows at about $15,000 below the average wage level at
your institution. In The Global Competitiveness Report 2008/2009, Canada
ranked 20th out of 134 countries on the brain drain phenomenon. Given the low
wage rate that your organization is offering these academic workers, it is easy to
understand why skilled and professional Canadians are fleeing this country for
greener pastures.

McMaster’s proposal, to freeze wages for three years will not help in solving the
political problem of government underfunding and the enormous cost of
operating a postsecondary institution. Business organizations are trying to solve
their financial challenges on the backs of workers. Morally-speaking, this ought
not to be the path of an institution of higher learning such as McMaster

University. These academic workers are willing to accept a modest 2% wage
increase, which is 1% below the average wage settlement in the university
sector. This willingness to accept less than other workers in the postsecondary
sector should have been interpreted as a gesture to work with the university in
this difficult economic period. This group of academic workers deserves a better
response to their noble effort.

The provision of dental benefits, parental leave, professional development funds
and protection of intellectual property rights are not outside of the current practice
of McMaster University. Yet your bargaining team continues to deny equality of
condition to Post-Doctoral Fellows on the preceding workplace benefits or rights.

The Global Competitiveness Report ranked Canada 19th on the extent of staff
training on the “Higher education and training” pillar of global competitiveness.
McMaster University’s unwillingness to provide its Post-Doctoral Fellows with
adequate professional development funds will only contribute to Canada’s
unenviable ranking among highly industrialized states for staff training and
development. It is difficult to justify the treatment of Post-Doctoral Fellows like
second-class organizational “citizens”. Surely, you can do better at the
bargaining table.

CUPE Local 3907 fully supports the efforts of Local 3906 to negotiate a fair
settlement for Post-Doctoral Fellows at McMaster University. CUPE 3906 can
count on our local’s solidarity with the actions it takes to achieve substantive
organizational justice for Post-Doctoral Fellows at the bargaining table.

Sincerely,

Ajamu Nangwaya, Chair External

Cc: Dr. Allison Sekular – Dean of Graduate Studies
Ms. Lisa Newton, Legal Employee and Labour Relations
Brother Jesse Payne, Staff Representative, CUPE Local 3906
Sister Mary Ellen Campbell, President, CUPE Local 3906

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By admin, October 26, 2009 7:42 pm

252 Bloor Street West, Room 8-104

Toronto, ON M5S 1V6  (416) 978-2403

October 26, 2009

Dear Sisters and Brothers of Local 3906:

Re: Solidarity with Local 3906’s effort to get a fair collective agreement

The members of CUPE Local 3907 stand firmly in solidarity with CUPE Local 3906’s principled and relentless bargaining efforts to seek a fair collective agreement for your 2,700 Teaching Assistants and Research Assistants at McMaster University. McMaster is shamelessly trying to solve the political problem of provincial government underfunding of the postsecondary sector on the backs of the academic workers in your Unit 1. We must vigorously rebuff this neoliberal attack on your members.

We firmly believe that it is not unreasonable for the academic workers at McMaster to be offered a fair deal which addresses vital workplace issues such as less crowded classrooms, manageable workloads, and protection from the erosion of employee benefits and tuition fee increases. The Employer should be ashamed that they have not made a better effort to address these issues despite the significant modifications your local has made to its proposals. Furthermore, it is an outright insult for the Employer to respond to your efforts with a concessionary package which merely offers a slight increase in wages. Surely the Employer is just as aware as its workers that the issue of equitable, safe and just workplaces is much more than a patronizing increase in salary.

Brothers and sisters of CUPE 3906, your struggle is a just one. CUPE Local 3907 stands in solidarity with you as you attempt to negotiate a fair collective agreement for the academic workers at McMaster during the upcoming mediation process and beyond. You may count on CUPE 3907’s material and moral support for the actions that you will undertake to vigorously defend the right to decent wages and fair working conditions for the Teaching and Research Assistants in Unit 1. In the event of a strike, Local 3907 will mobilize flying squads to support your picket line.

In solidarity,

Ajamu Nangwaya

Chair Internal

Cc: Peter George, President, McMaster University

Al Orth, Chief NegotiatorCUPCUEp

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By admin, October 26, 2009 11:25 am

252 Bloor Street West, Room 8-104

Toronto, ON M5S 1V6

(416) 978-2403

October 23, 2009

Dear Sisters and Brothers of Local 3902’s Unit 3:

Re: Solidarity with your effort to get a fair collective agreement

The members of CUPE Local 3907 stand firmly in solidarity with CUPE Local 3902’s attempt at the bargaining table to seek a fair collective agreement for sessional instructors at the University of Toronto. It is unconscionable for the University of Toronto to virtually ignore your proposals on job security and fair wages given the fact that your contribution as teachers is a phenomenon that is held in high regard at the educational institution. As sessional instructors, you teach about 30 per cent of all courses at this university and certainly should command that proportion of the combined wages paid to tenure-track staff and sessional instructors.

In respect to compensation, the concept of internal equity and external equity are used as measurements of the degree to which workers in comparable categories measure up to each other on wages and working conditions. Upward adjustments are normally made, where necessary. As sessional instructors, it very clear that you are being taken advantage of by the employer who is offering wage levels, which are below that of your peers in the Greater Toronto Area. The employer should be participating in a political campaign with other stakeholders to demand increased funding from the provincial government for the postsecondary sector in Ontario. The employer should not try to solve the problem of underfunding by denying you a just wage settlement and decent working conditions.

CUPE Local 3902’s bargaining proposals are quite reasonable. CUPE Local 3907 stands in solidarity with your local’s efforts to defend your right to decent working conditions, access to internal and external funding opportunities, voluntary participation in university governance structures and fair wages.

In solidarity,

Ajamu Nangwaya

Chair Internal

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By admin, October 13, 2009 8:34 pm

A few photos of our members at National Convention this past summer 2009 in Montreal.

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By admin, July 3, 2009 12:48 pm

On July 3, 2009, CUPE 3907 urged Minister Kent to immediately contact the Haitian Government to express Canada’s concern over the violations of Ronald Dauphin’s civil and healthcare rights, and recommend that Mr. Dauphin be immediately transported to a hospital for full treatment of his illness. Read the full letter below:
252 Bloor Street West, Room 8-104, Toronto ON, M5S 1V6
Phone: (416) 978-2403; email: cupe3907@oise.utoronto.ca

Sent by email (hard copy to follow)

July 3, 2009

Honourable Peter Kent
Minister of State of Foreign Affairs (Americas)
Foreign Affairs and International Trade Canada
125 Sussex Drive
Ottawa, ON, Canada
K1A 0G2

Dear Minister Kent:

Re: Haitian Political Prisoner Ronald Dauphin

CUPE Local 3907 would like to express its urgent and great concern about Mr. Ronald
Dauphin, a seriously ill political prisoner in Haiti who is being denied medical treatment.
Mr. Dauphin, a grassroots activist for the Fanmi Lavalas party, has spent some five
years in prison without trial.

A recent US-based human rights delegation from the state of California saw Mr.
Dauphin during a visit to the National Penitentiary on April 16. The delegation included a
nurse and an emergency medical technician, who examined Mr. Dauphin and
concluded that he suffered from multiple serious and perhaps life-threatening health
problems. Mr. Dauphin even lost consciousness during the examination.
Mr. Dauphin’s family and his attorney have tried to obtain medical treatment for Mr.
Dauphin, but the prison authorities have failed to provide authorization. His lawyer wrote
to the prison authority’s headquarters on April 23, and visited on April 24, 27 and 30,
asking for authorization for a private Haitian doctor to visit and treat Mr. Dauphin.
Mr. Dauphin was arrested by paramilitary forces, without a warrant, on March 1, 2004,
the day after President Aristide was forced into exile from Haiti. He was charged in 2005
with participating in a massacre, but on April 13, 2007, the Appeals Court ordered the
Trial Court to correct the “grave procedural errors,”  “violations of the right to defense,”
and “deplorable thoughtlessness” of the charging document. For the last two years, the
case has been stuck in legal limbo and has not advanced – it does not even have a Trial
Court judge assigned to it. Mr. Dauphin’s legal situation is explained in more detail in the
attached Background Paper prepared by human rights lawyers working in Haiti and the
US.
2
Five years’ imprisonment without trial is a great injustice in itself, but the injustice may
be converted to a death sentence soon if Mr. Dauphin does not get to a hospital. This
risk is real — one of Mr. Dauphin’s co-defendants, Wantales Lormejuste, died of
untreated tuberculosis, in the ambulance from the prison to the hospital in 2007. A few
weeks later, the Haitian court issued an order for Mr. Lormejuste’s provisional release.
The organization trust that you are aware of the fact that Amnesty International and
many other human rights organizations have documented repeated cases of human
rights violations against leaders and activists associated with the same Fanmi Lavalas
party with which Mr. Dauphin is associated.  The continuing mistreatment of Mr.
Dauphin indicates that this pattern of human rights violations in Haiti continues.
CUPE Local 3907 respectfully request that you instruct the Canadian Embassy in Haiti
to immediately contact the Haitian Government to express Canada’s concern over the
violations of Ronald Dauphin’s civil and healthcare rights, and recommend that Mr.
Dauphin be immediately transported to a hospital for full treatment of his illness. I also
request that the Canadian Embassy urge the Haitian Government to take all appropriate
measures to ensure that Mr. Dauphin is granted pre-trial release from prison, and that
his case is either dismissed or promptly brought to trial.
CUPE Local 3907 is requesting that you share with it the actions that your office or
Canada’s Embassy in Haiti will be taking on this human rights case.
Sincerely,

Ajamu Nangwaya
Chair External

Cc:  Ambassador Gilles Rivard, Port-au-Prince
prnce@international.gc.ca

Paul Dewar, NDP Foreign Affairs critic
dewarp@parl.gc.ca

Bob Rae, Liberal Foreign Affairs critic
raeb@parl.gc.ca

Paul Crete, Bloc Foreign Affairs critic
cretep@parl.gc.ca

Niraj Joshi, Canada-Haiti Action Network
niraj_joshi@sympatico.ca