Bargaining: Agreed Proposals
The Bargaining Committee is pleased to share the text of the amendments to the Collective Agreement that the CFA and employer have agreed on so far.
The following document, in parts 2 and 3, sets out all of the CFA proposals that we are still trying to negotiate with the employer. (Part 1 lists all of the original CFA proposals that are still part of the negotiations, both those on which we have agreed and those under negotiation.)
CFA proposals - tabled 15 September 09-15 CFA proposals PDF
Here are notes on the two documents of signed amendments to the collective agreement. We will provide notes on the third document proposals (still being negotiated) soon.
"06-26 Agreed" contains:
Articles 1.6.3, 11.6.8: “sunset clause” for records of discipline. Such records will be removed from the faculty member’s personnel file after 18 months.
Article 11.4A: Faculty must be appointed into functional areas.
This provision makes explicit that all faculty must be appointed into a functional area with full participation in “article 2.8” collegial decision-making. Administrators don’t directly hire or manage faculty.
2.1.8 Clarification of “dean” definition: This cleans up a provision that wasn’t fully updated back in the 1990s, after we codified the collegial model in the collective agreement.
(The provision refers to the directors’ grievance settlement. That document allows an administrator other than a dean to perform the dean role in four departments: Sunshine Coast Initiatives; CTE; Indigenous Education and Affairs; and Counselling/Accessibility Services. It also applied to Continuing Studies, but the University has unilaterally shut down that department–an action we are grieving. The agreement creates a fast-track grievance process for directors’ violations of the collective agreement. We are using this now (fall 2023) in response to actions by the Sunshine Coast regional director )
“09-15” contains:
8.4.4.3 to 8.4.4.5: Deletion of penalties for NREGs who miss more than 10 duty days.
To our knowledge, these penalties have not been applied in recent years. In any event, the penalty seemed unreasonable, so we proposed deleting them.
6.8.3 and 6.8.11: Removal of “sectoral workload rule” + “Outside activity” requires departmental approval if it may prevent completion of CapU duties.
This change removes the sectoral workload rule in 6.8.11. That rule required special permission for faculty to work more than 9.5 sections in the post-secondary sector. There was no mechanism for accurate or consistent monitoring of work outside CapU, and this rule only applied to post-secondary, not any other forms of work. It was impractical and inequitable, and only two other colleges or universities have anything similar (and nothing as restrictive as 9.5 sections).
This amendment also updates an outdated rule, in 6.8.3, that required the dean’s permission for full-time faculty to take work or engage in studies between 8:30 and 4:30 Monday-Friday.
Note: In a Frontlines message on 19 September, Mr Bharadwa described this as “Removal of restriction on section loads over an academic term and academic year.” That may lead you to think that the annual overload rules for work at CapU have been removed. Those rules are in a separate article entirely and remain in place.
10.8, Cross-reference to other leaves our faculty can use.
This is really a “housekeeping” amendment. It just highlights in our CapU collective agreement the other leaves that our faculty have a right to, but which are set out in the “Common Agreement.” The Federation of Post-Secondary Educators (FPSE) negotiates the latter agreement. Our agreement incorporates its terms, including these leaves.
8.4.4.1 “Indigenous identity and lived experience” as a basis for placing a new NREG on scale at the time of hiring.
This is one of three proposals we made to support Indigenous faculty. We are still negotiating for the other two. Initially the employer rejected them all unless we agreed to a committee they proposed for “decolonizing the collective agreement.”
As we have explained in earlier bulletins, we embraced the idea of a committee—as long as it was an inclusive committee dedicated to decolonizing the entire University. The employer emphatically rejected inclusivity and a university-wide scope.
It appeared we would not make headway on our Indigenous faculty proposals, but the employer has now agreed to this one. We have retabled the other two (see part 3 of the “09-15 CFA proposals” document).
Unsigned items (agreed in principle in bargaining, but at which the employer is now balking):
“IHR7” - a set of amendments to support diversity of representation on committees and in hiring criteria
See my earlier message about the change the employer sprang on us during the summer. We think this change is inappropriate.
“W1” academic year - see earlier note, and BB14.