Occupy the Courtyard — ‘We’re going to be here until the strike’s over’

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This article was published 20/10/2011 (5443 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A tent village has sprung up on the Brandon University campus after more than a dozen university students vowed to “occupy” the space until BU’s labour dispute is over.

Found in the courtyard between the Knowles-Douglas Student Union Building and Clark Hall, the student camp is an effort by ordinary students to pressure the university administration and the Brandon University Faculty Association to find a way to end the strike as quickly as possible.

“This is very much an event for the students, and against the strike,” said third-year music student Nathan Layh, who helped organize the Occupy the Courtyard event under the organization name Students for Students. “We’re going to be here until the strike’s over.”

Students met at 2 p.m. yesterday to begin setting up their tents and other equipment. By 5:30 p.m., there were 12 tents set up on site, including a first aid tent, an “Occupy Headquarters” tent and a much-needed heat tent on the west side.

The wider Brandon community has been very generous, supplying extra tents, blankets, fire extinguishers, hot soup and food, among other items.

“It’s amazing how quickly everybody’s come together for it,” said BU student and event co-organizer Krystal Kayne.

“We just started talking about this 18 hours ago and we have all this so far. It started off with seven or eight of us. And people are phoning and asking and helping and we’ve already got lots of blankets and some people donated tents already.”

But both Kayne and Kayh are requesting any further help residents and businesses can offer to keep everyone warm, fed and safe. Temperatures were likely to reach -7 C last night, according to Environment Canada.

“We need heaters,” noted Kayne, who shivered in an icy breeze when she spoke to the Sun.

In spite of the harsh conditions, Layh says he wants all Brandon University students — no matter whether they support the faculty, the administration, or who want to stay neutral — to feel free to join the occupation. The point, he says, is for students to join together to tell both sides that they just want to get the education they paid for.

“We want to show both parties that we want the strike to come to an end now,” Layh said. “It’s not just a bunch of angry kids. We’re not being given what we paid for.”

“We just want the strike over,” added Kayne. “The main point is to bring the students together so we can end the strike and get back to class.”

Unfortunately for the students, it appeared the strike could carry on well into next week.

When reached by the Sun Wednesday morning, BUFA chief negotiator Joe Dolecki said both sides had taken a day off from negotiations while the conciliator attended to a prior commitment in Winnipeg.

“Both parties were made aware of this well in advance,” Dolecki said. “We’re taking a step back for a day and we’ll see what happens in the next 24 hours. Right now there aren’t any meetings scheduled, however there may be meetings that will emerge after today.”

Talks between the two sides ended on Tuesday afternoon, and Dolecki says negotiations went backwards when the administration came back to the bargaining table with “the same offer they had made before in terms of salary.”

Then, in a press release to media late Wednesday afternoon, the administration said the conciliation talks were “still in progress,” echoing Dolecki in that both parties knew of the conciliator’s prior engagement. However, it suggested that BUFA refused to sit down to the bargaining table until next Monday.

“The parties are both working on getting to a settlement. The last offer was made by BU to BUFA, to which BUFA has not yet responded,” the statement said. “Both the conciliator and the University are available to continue conciliation on Thursday (tomorrow), Friday and Saturday, but through the conciliator BUFA has informed BU that they will not meet again until Monday.”

The university once again offered arbitration or mediation/arbitration as an alternative process to conciliation talks.

Thus far, Manitoba’s NDP government has refrained from intervening in the bargaining process. The Sun was refused an interview with Labour Minister Jennifer Howard yesterday. Instead, Jodee Mason, press secretary to cabinet, sent the following statement on behalf of the government:

“We have assigned a conciliator to work with the parties and we are confident they can reach an agreement with this assistance. This will mean students can return to class and the university can get back to normal day-to-day business.”

» mgoerzen@brandonsun.com