The University of Ottawa teaching assistants’ union voted 81 per cent in favour of a strike mandate last week, according to a press release from Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) Local 2626. CUPE 2626 represents 3,800 teaching assistants, research assistants, correctors and lab monitors at the University of Ottawa, the press release says. The union has been without a contract since Aug. 31. CUPE attempted to begin bargaining as far back as June, Local 2626 president Felix Grenier said. The union and the university did not meet until early September and this meeting was far from successful, Grenier said.
Grenier describes the union’s main issues as “equity, security and efficiency”.
He said the union objects to rising tuition fees and commented that Carleton University’s TAs had made similar demands.
He mentioned that the university’s speed in processing grievances is also an issue. “Right now, it can take up to six, eight, 12 months to solve a grievance.” Grenier said.
By security, Grenier said he was referring to various members of the union, research assistants under the Faculty of Law in particular, who are not covered by the proposed collective agreement.When neither party found the bargaining process productive, the union and the university decided to meet with a mediator, Grenier continued.
The union staged the strike mandate vote to prove that members of CUPE 2626 support the positions of the bargaining committee up to the point of a strike, Grenier said.
The strike mandate has yet to sway the general student body.
“I asked around a couple of my friends and none of them has really heard about [the strike mandate],” said Richard Fong, a third-year political science student at the U of O.
Grenier said the union remains optimistic that a strike can be averted and a bargain reached.
“I think the unions are starting to win this battle,” he said.
University of Ottawa spokesperson Vincent Lamontagne said talks were scheduled into 2011 and it was “impossible to speculate” on what agreement might be reached, but said the administration was optimistic the two sides would reach an agreement.
—with files from Ruby Pratka