Toronto – OPSEU/SEFPO President Warren (Smokey) Thomas is calling on the Ontario government to immediately implement social distancing regulations, capacity limits and other health measures to protect faculty, support staff and students at Ontario’s 24 public colleges.
“Now is not the time to cut corners on health and safety,” said Thomas. “Faculty, support staff and students at our colleges should have the same basic protections that all other Ontarians in schools, workplaces and child care centres have. We are asking the Employer to sit down with us and work in a constructive manner to do what’s best for students and staff in our colleges.”
Thomas’s remarks come in the wake of the imposition of a modified provincial stage two, including online learning for elementary schools and a significantly delayed start for universities. However, many college classes started on January 4.
Thomas noted that when the modified lockdown was announced, it included colleges, but within 24 hours, it was changed to exclude them – an exclusion for which the college employer had lobbied.
“So now we have OPSEU/SEFPO members at work with no capacity limits to the number of students in classrooms, no physical distancing requirements, no contact tracing requirements, no guaranteed time for sick days or isolation, no priority vaccination boosters and no requirements for HEPA filtration systems,” added Thomas. “This is just asking for trouble.”
OPSEU/SEFPO represents thousands of college faculty and full-time and part-time support staff. The union asked for a meeting with the College Employer Council on health and safety, but was told it would not be possible until next week.
“The province has been hit with an avalanche of new COVID-19 cases, and our hospital system is staring down a potential disaster,” he noted. “It’s everyone’s responsibility to act in a timely matter to protect public health and keep Ontarians as safe as possible – including Ontario’s public colleges.”
Thomas added it was in everyone’s best interests to find a solution.
“We must ensure our faculty, support staff and students are protected as much as possible. We’re all reasonable people and reasonable people can solve problems.”
For more information:
Warren (Smokey) Thomas, 613-329-1931;
RM Kennedy, Chair, OPSEU/SEFPO College Faculty Division, 416-346-8382;
Other Bargaining Updates
Arbitrator awards improvements far beyond those offered by Employer in negotiations
Click here to download a PDF of the bulletin The award affects areas including:• Equity;• Indigenization;• Partial-load job security;and acknowledges workload associated with multi-modal courses. This is an historic moment in CAAT-A’s continued fight for equity, job...
Ontario College Faculty Achieve Historic Gains in new Collective Agreement
Toronto – Fifteen months after the commencement of a round of bargaining that included the largest work-to-rule faculty job action in the history of Canadian Colleges and Universities, labour negotiations between OPSEU/SEFPO’s college faculty division and the College...
College faculty arbitration update
OPSEU/SEFPO CAAT Academic and the CEC participated in a mediation/arbitration September 7-9, 2022. Following the mediation part of the proceeding, an arbitration occurred on September 9, 2022. The arbitrator’s award will form the new collective agreement and it is...
College faculty bargaining team statement
The college faculty bargaining team has issued the following statement: Arbitrator William Kaplan has imposed a media blackout on the upcoming voluntary mediation-interest arbitration between the colleges’ and college faculty bargaining teams. There will be no further...
Joint statement by OPSEU/SEFPO and the College Employer Council
OPSEU/SEFPO’s college faculty bargaining team and the College Employer Council have issued the following statement: The parties have reached an agreement to enter binding interest arbitration and the strike that was scheduled to commence at 12:01 am on March 18, 2022,...
College faculty to resume talks with employer
Toronto – With some 16,000 college faculty set to go on strike at 12:01 Friday morning, the College Employer Council (CEC) and the faculty bargaining team have agreed to meet Thursday. “We were encouraged that the CEC replied to our letter and have agreed to meet...
College faculty set strike deadline
TORONTO – Some 16,000 faculty at Ontario’s 24 public colleges say they will go on strike at 12:01 a.m. on Friday, March 18 if the College Employer Council (CEC) does not agree to voluntary binding interest arbitration. The faculty bargaining team sent an open letter...
Work to Rule: Phase 3
Started 12:01am, March 02, 2022 Focus Work-to-rule must impact the functioning of the colleges in order to work as a bargaining strategy to bring the Council back to the table to discuss faculty’s needs. The colleges and CEC have chosen to abandon negotiations and to...
College faculty reject contract, call on employer to negotiate or arbitrate
TORONTO – Ontario college faculty have rejected a contract offer from their employer, and OPSEU/SEFPO President Warren (Smokey) Thomas hopes the result will trigger a return to the bargaining table. “I am convinced a negotiated settlement is there and within reach,”...
Legal Brief Supports Faculty Proposals
Throughout this round of bargaining, the College Employer Council (CEC) has repeatedly refused to negotiate significant issues regarding workload, staffing, or fairness for partial-load faculty. They have justified their obstinacy by claiming that changes to these...
Information for OPSEU/SEFPO members in the CAAT-Academic Division about the February 15-17 forced-offer vote
A forced-offer vote will be held in February for college faculty members represented by OPSEU/SEFPO starting February 15. The vote was scheduled after the College Employer Council (CEC) asked the Ontario Labour Relations Board (OLRB) last week to schedule the online...
Five reasons to REJECT the CEC’s forced offer
Click here for a printable PDF version The College Employer Council’s forced offer fails. It’s a terrible contract that fails faculty, fails students and threatens to harm the entire college system. All faculty should vote to reject the colleges’ offer, because: (x)...