BU trying to force mediation: union

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This article was published 18/11/2011 (5413 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

BRANDON — THE Brandon University Faculty Association says it was blindsided with a demand for a Thursday conciliation meeting even though negotiating sessions were ongoing to settle a 38-day faculty strike.

Faculty Association president Joe Dolecki said both sides were trading proposals, including a four-year contract concept that had been submitted by BUFA, when it received a letter from conciliator Dennis Harrison requesting another conciliation session for Thursday afternoon.

“We are calling on the university to stop playing legal games with us, in particular this business with the conciliator, and to tell the government, especially Conciliation Services, to stop playing games with us and to sit down at the table and resolve this thing.”

“We are determined to resolve this matter at the table and we can do it,” Dolecki said. “We could do it today. All it takes is a molecule of will from the other side.”

Dolecki said in a letter to Manitoba Labour Minister Jennifer Howard that the conciliation process ended on Oct. 21 with the appointment of a mediator and he was “disturbed”�àthat Harrison was seeking more meetings.

However, both a spokeswoman for Howard and Brandon University chief negotiator Grant Mitchell said the government never considered the conciliator’s work to have been completed.

While Dolecki said the two sides are only $220,000 apart over four years, Mitchell said the financial proposals are more like $500,000 apart.

Dolecki said the faculty association wants no part of a renewed conciliation process because BUFA believes it is only being done to meet a legal requirement that would enable the administration to demand binding arbitration as early as Dec. 10.

“That belief is based on bad legal advice,” Dolecki said.

“There are three conditions required in order for them to legally put forward a request to the labour board.

“One of them is that conciliation had occurred for 30 days. Conciliation ended on Oct. 21, and mediation ended in mid-November, so they are short eight to 10 days.

“So this is an attempt, in our view, to overcome this problem.”

Dolecki then questioned whether the conciliator, Dennis Harrison, could be considered impartial under those circumstances, as his services were not requested, and he appears to BUFA to be helping administration force an unwanted arbitration hearing upon the union.

Mitchell said if the strike is not resolved by Dec. 12, the university will file the request for arbitration with the Manitoba Labour Board. Dolecki said the faculty association would challenge it.

kborkowsky@brandonsun.com