The Alberta Union of Provincial Employees (AUPE) and Athabasca University Faculty Association (AUFA) are disputing comments Athabasca University board of governors public member Andy Neigel made in a letter to the editor in the Sept. 24 issue of the Athabasca Advocate.
AUPE president Guy Smith said they felt they had to respond.
“It portrays a false picture of what is actually going on,” he said.
AU recently announced more layoffs to begin this fall. The university previously stated 44 staff members were laid off in the first round of layoffs in the spring, 24 of whom were based in Athabasca.
AUPE members who are given a temporary layoff notice must take unpaid leaves of at least eight days throughout the year. AUPE represents more than 270 support staff, and the union says most members will be temporarily laid off.
Smith said AUPE is filing grievances on each of the layoff notices because he believes they violate the collective agreement.
“It will severely impact services to students who are paying tuition to be serviced properly when they attend the university,” he said. “It is going to be a economic hit to the community.
“This is obviously being dictated by the Government of Alberta and the Advanced Education Minister, Thomas Lukaszuk … forcing many universities and colleges to take extraordinary measures because their funding was cut this year,” Smith explained. “I really think it is incumbent upon these universities and colleges across the province to stand up to a government that is bullying them into making unnecessary cuts.”
Smith is thinking about not just post-secondary education, but also the province.
“Those facilities help educate the next generation of skilled workers, and if people aren’t able to get the education they need, then that is going to hurt Alberta in the long run,” he said. “We see these cuts by the government as very short-sighted and detrimental.
“They are forcing the universities and colleges to bring down the hammer and force these cuts through,” he explained. “The responsibility for the whole situation in post-secondary education rests with the minister.”
Smith said AUPE represents many workers at post-secondary institutions across the province.
“Some students are being forced to move out of their communities to get the education they need; their programs are being closed down,” he said.
Smith exclaimed, “This is Alberta. We are a wealthy province that is growing in population and growing in economic activity, and it is mind-boggling how they are dealing with government finances.”
AUFA president Mark McCutcheon thinks Neigel’s letter to the editor run on Sept. 24 is detrimental to bargaining.
“Bargaining is presently a confidential arbitration process,” he said. “For the administration, never mind the board, to communicate directly with members and the public — that is problematic in the context of bargaining.”
McCutcheon said AUFA wants to correct what it sees as errors in the letter.
“The administration is fairly intent on eliminating faculty association jobs,” he said. “That is taking some of our members to permanent layoff.”
AUPE is facing temporary layoffs, while AUFA is facing permanent layoffs.
“We have come up with lots of other ideas that the university administration should consider to find the savings they need to reach for this quarter,” he said. “Really, the only idea that they have indicated for us to consider would be for us to actually provide names of those who would be willing to let themselves be laid off.”
McCutcheon said the university seems to be intent on layoffs instead of finding savings elsewhere.
“We have communication with our members and with administration about what some of those other savings might be,” he explained. “They haven’t taken up the possibility of inviting voluntary leave without pay, which our collective agreement allows for.”
McCutcheon states the university isn’t looking at projects that are currently in progress.
“Some of these are very expensive projects,” he said. “While they may be important to the long-term career of the institution, are they projects that need to go ahead right now during the financial crisis?”
McCutcheon said there are a number of staff members who are putting their names forward to be laid off.
“That is the situation we are in,” he said.
