As we come to the end of a full week of bargaining, I would like to extend to this unit and the UWOFA team supporting the negotiation and communication processes a hearty round of gratitude. The strength of this collective is exemplary and indefatigable. Brava. 

The Employer returned 1 article:

• Workload – the parties are close to agreement

UWOFA returned 2 articles and 1 Letter of Understanding: 

• Professional Leave – the parties are close to sign-off pending monetary conversations 
• Workload – the parties are close to agreement 
  • UWOFA continues to reassert that workload should not be impacted by vacancies 
• LOU Planning Processes
  • The parties are discussing the best ways to ensure that language regarding planning accurately describes the experiences of all Members of the Bargaining Unit.

We are at the table next week from Monday to Wednesday.

Today’s session was short but significant in that we were able to outline key concerns about the increasing deprofessionalization of librarianship, informed by both relevant literature and autoethnographic research. Here is what we have to report. 

The parties signed off on the LOU Job Descriptions. 

UWOFA returned 2 articles and introduced 1 new LOU:

• Biennial Report and Review (no longer annual)
  • After consultation with Bargaining Unit members, we don’t have a clear mandate to accept peer evaluation as a component of Report and Review.
  • Members may request a meeting with immediate supervisors for an informal review between scheduled Reports 
• LOU Transition Provisions for Biennial Report and Review (new)
  • This LOU outlines the processes of transitioning from an annual reporting schedule to a biennial cycle – these changes will not apply until the 2023-24 reporting cycle.
• Responsibilities of Members
  • We continued our discussion of the deprofessionalization of librarianship. Librarian colleagues at the table shared examples from their lived experiences and those of their colleagues. The Employer thanked us for the depth of our presentation. The session was very powerful and we hope that it motivates the Employer toward creative solutions.   
  • We reiterated our proposal that when Members are assisted in Professional Practice by non-Members, such assistance must be led by Members.

The Employer returned 1 article:

• Professional Leave – the parties are very close to agreement

We are at the table again tomorrow for a full day.

This continues to be a busy week of bargaining with UWOFA and the Employer meeting each day. We are pleased by the progress we are making in some areas, but are disappointed to report that we remain far apart in others, most notably any proposals that involve a commitment to maintaining or increasing personnel in the Bargaining Unit.  

In the session today the Parties continued to exchange proposals:

UWOFA returned 2 articles and 1 Letter of Understanding  

Professional Leave – the parties have agreed to a new accrual timeline for Academic Activity Leaves which allows for Leaves to a maximum of 10 months (previously 9). 

Workload – the parties continue to move toward agreement. UWOFA reasserted our language that vacancies shall not increase Member Workload. 

LOU Job Descriptions – the parties have agreed on a process to create job descriptions. 

The EMPLOYER returned 1 Letter of Understanding 

LOU – Annual Planning Process – the parties continue to discuss the relationship between the annual planning process and a Member’s planned activities and contributions. 

Related to the LOU – Librarian and Archivist Qualifications, the parties also had a productive discussion about what it would mean to accurately identify and distinguish the roles of librarians and archivists in University documents and communications.

Thank you to everyone who completed the survey about Report and Review last week. Your feedback has been instrumental in helping us to effectively advocate for you at the bargaining table. We intend to discuss this article with the Employer later this week. Tabled proposals will be posted in the shared Member area. 

Please save the date for an information session on Wednesday July 5th, 10-11am. This will again be a hybrid session – location and Zoom link to follow. 

This is a busy week of bargaining as UWOFA and the Employer have 4 days of consecutive meetings scheduled. 

The parties have now signed off on Working Conditions.

In the session today the Parties also exchanged a number of previously tabled proposals (4 LOUs and 5 Articles):

• LOU on Members with Disabilities Joint Working Group – the parties are approaching agreement
• LOU Promotion of Members with Continuing Appointment at Assistant Rank – the Employer has rejected this proposal
• LOU on the Ratio of Librarians to Students – UWOFA reasserted this proposal and shared a figure with the Employer showing that the ratio of students to a single librarian or archivist has increased between 2010 and 2019, from 478 to 751 (a 57% increase). The Employer has reiterated that it will not entertain such a proposal. They argue that while we might all be unhappy with these numbers, we have no choice but to do more with less (citing a looming spectre of austerity).
• LOU Member Offices – the Employer rejected this proposal
• Appointments – UWOFA reasserted our proposals regarding how vacancies are dealt with in the case of transfer, secondment, leave, retirement, or resignation. UWOFA countered the Employer’s proposal to increase the possible length of Term Appointments with language that would convert positions filled by Term Appointments to permanent appointments after three years. 
• Library Directors and Heads – UWOFA rejected the Employer’s proposal regarding the length of Acting Directors or Heads. The Employer rejected UWOFA’s proposal regarding on-call work.
• Responsibilities of Members – the Employer agreed to remove the constraint on Academic Activity.
• Retirement and Resignation – the parties are approaching agreement, including on the introduction of a phased retirement supplement. The Employer has rejected UWOFA’s language to protect the complement. 
• Workload – the Employer continues to resist ensuring that workload not be impacted by loss of personnel 

UWOFA tabled a new LOU Job Descriptions which would classify the existing role definitions as job descriptions under the Collective Agreement and require the Employer to create job descriptions for any positions without an existing role definition. This LOU also reiterates existing processes in the Collective Agreement for changing a Member’s job description. The Employer accepted this proposal.

As always, details of the proposals discussed today can be accessed by Bargaining Unit Members in the Sync folder. 

The Employer plans to bring responses to UWOFA’s monetary proposals next week.  These include: Compensation and Benefits; Income Security; Pregnancy, Parental and Adoption Leave; and Vacations and Holidays.

Bargaining will continue through Friday, with three sessions also scheduled at the start of next week and three more following the long weekend.

LONDON, June 14th, 2023 – On Friday June 9th, UWOFA held a meeting of members and invited guests, to discuss academic freedom in the context of threats to research security and recent changes to government policies which place limits on both what research can be done and with whom. These policies have had a chilling effect on the capacity of many of our academic colleagues (both at Western and across the country) to do their work.

UWOFA is very concerned about these serious issues. Our goals with this session were to ensure members were well-informed, by including speakers representing a variety of vantage points, and to remind everyone that academic freedom is a lynchpin of scholarship which we all must defend.  

Currently, UWOFA has received minimal guidance from our Employer regarding what constitutes a research threat, how Members should respond if they are contacted by a CSIS agent, and how any information collected will be treated (where it will be stored and for how long, who has access to it).

UWOFA is calling for our Employer to commit to the Pearson-Laskin Accord particularly the following principles: Members need to be advised of their rights should they ever encounter CSIS agents, and Western Administration needs to be transparent in communicating with UWOFA regarding CSIS interventions, including letting us know when and how any collaboration between our Employer and government security agencies is taking place.

For more information please contact: uwofaco@uwo.ca   

UWOFA and the Employer had their fourth bargaining meeting June 12.  

In this session UWOFA presented all of our remaining proposals and the Parties exchanged a number of articles previously tabled. The Parties are reaching agreement on some; however, the Employer expressed strong rejection of a number of our proposals today. 

UWOFA Presented 2 Articles and 1 Letter of Understanding

• Compensation and Benefits (and related monetary items) 
• Duration of the Agreement 
  • We are proposing a 3 year agreement 
• Letter Of Understanding (LOU) for Academic Activity Support Fund 
  • We propose to remove this LOU and move it into the Compensation and Benefits Article 

The Parties Exchanged Several Articles

• The Parties have reached agreement on Working Conditions and the non-monetary elements of Education Leave. 
• The Parties continue to have productive discussion regarding Professional Leave, Promotion and Continuing Appointment, Retirement and Resignation, and Workload.
• The Employer rejected our proposals related to complement in Appointments and the New LOU for Librarian and Archivist Qualifications and the New LOU Ratios of Librarians and Archivists to Students LOU.  

Bargaining will resume next week on Tuesday, June 20th, with meetings continuing to the end of the week. 

Thank-you to everyone who attended the Bargaining Information session last week (May 31st), both in person and remotely. We appreciate your time, attention and input, as we work collaboratively to bargain for a strong collective agreement for all.

A copy of the slides are available in the Sync shared folder to which all Members of the Bargaining Unit have access. Please speak to a member of the CBC if you are accessing the folder for the first time. 

UWOFA and the Employer had their third bargaining meeting on June 6. All of the tabled bargaining proposals are available in the Sync shared folder.

In this session the Employer returned 3 articles with amended language for discussion – Report and Review, Promotion and Continuing Appointment, and Working Conditions: 

Annual Report and Review

• The Parties achieved broad general agreement and have agreed in principle to most of the revisions proposed by UWOFA.   
• The Parties continue to discuss evaluation by peer committee. UWOFA will send a survey to members to gather feedback. 

Promotion and Continuing Appointment

• The Parties achieved broad general agreement on UWOFA’s proposed changes, including the following areas:
  • Process for an annual meeting separate from ARR meetings for members on a Probationary Appointment
  • Procedures for disposition of P&CA files

Working Conditions

• The employer has agreed to UWOFA’s proposal.

Bargaining will resume Monday, June 12th.

Now that bargaining is underway, we have begun to share a series of videos introducing L&A members. You can find them on our various social media channels: YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. They will also be archived on the UWOFA website. Please share widely!

UWOFA and the Employer had their second bargaining meeting on May 16.

We have now signed off on additional Housekeeping items: one LOU – regarding Covid-19 Pandemic Provisions, and one Article – Professional Expense Reimbursement. The LOU documents accommodations provided during Covid, setting a precedent for any future disaster scenarios. PER claims can now be submitted up until the expiry of any new Collective Agreement provided they are incurred within the allotted time-frame.

In this session UWOFA presented proposals for 8 articles and 5 Letters of Understanding (LOUs) – 3 of which are new:

Appointments

• Complement is a primary concern for the bargaining unit. This proposal seeks to maintain complement by ensuring that permanent or temporary vacancies which result from resignation, retirement, termination, secondment or leave are filled.
• The Employer argues that bargaining complement impinges upon their belief in a right to hire. UWOFA does not share this view

Education Leave

• Proposes a contingency for Members who experience illness or injury while on leave, allowing  the Leave to be cancelled and possibly deferred

Library Directors and Heads

• Proposes to clarify that the on-call duties of Library Directors relate only to the Faculty-based libraries for which they are responsible, while the on-call duties of Heads shall relate only to their Units

Professional Leave

• Proposes to extend the maximum lengths of Academic Activity and Study Leaves to allow Members to propose more ambitious projects or to fully complete projects within the period of leave provided.
• Proposes to remove current limitations which only allow for 2 FTE leaves per year across the entire bargaining unit

Responsibilities of Members

• Clarifies that when Members receive assistance in Professional Practice from non-Members, it should be led by Members
• This protects the  professional autonomy and expertise of Librarians and Archivists
• Removes the requirement that Academic Activity must be related to librarianship or archival practice to expand Members’ options for Academic Activity and remove any potential infringement on academic freedom 

Retirement and Resignation

• Proposes additional financial supports for a Phased Retirement transition (this is similar to a provision in the Faculty Collective Agreement)
• Proposes that if a Member enters Phased Retirement and maintains a Workload of 50% or less, the position should be filled to help facilitate training and institutional knowledge transfer. 

Vacation and Holidays

• Proposes regular and gradual increases to vacation entitlement so that Members would no longer need to wait till they have 19 years of full time service to see increases beyond 22 days.

Workload

• Proposes that Workload shall be consistent with Member’s qualifications, position, and specific responsibilities as identified in their job description
• Clarifies language to ensure that Workload is rooted in a Member’s qualifications and job description and can be informed by operational strategic and annual planning, but is not led by those processes. 
• Proposes a process of negotiation regarding significant changes to a Member’s Workload, suggesting a variety of possible mutually acceptable solutions
• States that it is not acceptable for Workload to increase as a result of a position vacancy 

LOU: Annual Planning Process

• Proposes a language adjustment to reinforce that operational plans must not, by definition, dictate Workload

LOU (New): Librarian and Archivist Qualifications

• Reinforces that the qualifications required to be hired as a Librarian or Archivist are only for those library positions
• Proposes that the roles of Librarians and Archivists be accurately distinguished and identified relative to other library staff in both internal and external documents and communications
• Librarians and Archivists are structurally made invisible on campus through such services as  “Ask a Librarian” chat service available on the Western Libraries website, which is not staffed by librarians at Western. Also, Librarians and Archivists are not included as a distinct employee group in University budget and planning documents, but included in the broad category of staff.

LOU (New): Promotion of Members with Continuing Appointment at Assistant Rank

• Proposes that Members grandparented with Continuing Appointment at Assistant Rank be promoted to Associate Rank, to align with the requirement for Continuing Appointment established in 2015 and  better reflect the experience and expertise of those Members

LOU (New): Ratios of Librarians and Archivists to Students

• Proposes to establish a 1:700 ratio of Librarians and Archivists to students, over the life of the agreement
• Designed to address the need to have a complement with the capacity to adequately support student enrolment growth, a key element of Western’s strategic plan

LOU: Transition Promotion Fund

• Proposes to let this lapse, contingent on the new LOU: Promotion of Members – see above

We will continue to post articles as we open them in a Bargaining Unit Member-only space. Members can also find details of the Employer’s proposals and signed-off items from Housekeeping there. UWOFA-LA Members should contact a member of the Collective Bargaining Committee (CBC – see below) who will then facilitate their access to this folder:

• Samuel Cassady
• Kristin Hoffmann
• Denise Horoky
• Erin Johnson
• Liz Mantz
• Brian McMillan
• Katya Pereyaslavska
• Stephen Spong
• Leslie Thomas
• Courtney Waugh
• Johanna Weststar
  

The Employer has asked to take Friday’s scheduled session for their own caucus and the UWOFA Negotiations Team has agreed. As we have shared twenty proposals with them over two days, I am sure they have a lot to discuss. 

Bargaining will resume June 6th. 

Please Save the Date: Wednesday, May 31st, 11am-12pm for a Bargaining Information Meeting. More info to come soon.

UWOFA and the Employer had their first bargaining meeting on May 15, 2023. Chief Negotiator Johanna Weststar opened the meeting by highlighting key issues and goals for this round of bargaining – complement, workload, recognition of professionalisation, and compensation. The Employer has signalled an intention to do what they reasonably can to reflect post Bill-124 settlements emerging in the sector, while also alluding to concerns about fiscal prudence, which are not unfamiliar.

Some housekeeping items remain to be concluded, but we expect to be done with them by the end of the week. We shared an overview of all our proposals and presented the ones listed below. The Employer presented three non-monetary proposals for Annual Report and Review (ARR), Appointments, and Library Directors & Heads. 

UWOFA is proposing to open 15 articles and 4 Letters of Understanding (LOUs). Many proposals seek to achieve parity with the gains of the recently negotiated Faculty Collective Agreement. Additionally the UWOFA negotiating team is proposing 4 new LOUs, addressing support for members with disabilities, establishing an appropriate ratio of Librarians & Archivists to students, ensuring recognition and protection of professional qualifications, and providing a pathway to promotion for members grandparented at Assistant with Continuing status. 

UWOFA presented proposals in full for 5 articles and 2 LOUs:

Report and Review

• Proposes to increase efficiencies in Report and Review by moving to biennial reporting and ensuring it serves its purpose
• Introduces new requirements for professional development meetings separate from performance evaluation and training for supervisors
• Separates Report and Review from the process for Promotion and Continuing Appointment  

Income Security 

• Introduces caregiving leaves 

Pregnancy, Parental and Adoption Leave 

• Proposes to remove eligibility conditions relating to length of employment and to remove the punitive penalty Members are currently subjected to should they terminate their employment within 6 months of returning from leave

Promotion and Continuing Appointment

• Proposes an annual meeting with the Chief Librarian or Dean for Members on a Probationary Appointment
• Establishes processes to encourage Members to go up for promotion

Working Conditions 

• Clarifies that the Employer will provide a computer and upgrades as required for Members to fulfill their Responsibilities

LOU: Members with Disabilities Joint Working Group (JWG)

• Expands the mandate of the JWG established through faculty bargaining to include Librarians and Archivists 

LOU: Member Offices  

• Ensures that Members who are relocated on campus are provided with offices in their new space 

We will continue to post articles as we open them in a Bargaining Unit Member-only space. Members can also find details of the Employer’s proposals and signed-off items from Housekeeping there. UWOFA-LA Members should contact a member of the Collective Bargaining Committee (CBC – see below) to get access to this folder:

• Samuel Cassady
• Kristin Hoffmann
• Denise Horoky
• Erin Johnson
• Liz Mantz
• Brian McMillan
• Katya Pereyaslavska
• Stephen Spong
• Leslie Thomas
• Courtney Waugh
• Johanna Weststar
  

Bargaining continues this week with meetings scheduled on May 16 in the afternoon and again on Friday May 19. You can look forward to a new update shortly after each session.

UWOFA has been hard at work and has much to report to members. Items herein are crucial for the climate and conditions of our workplace. Please read on!

Bargaining Bulletin 

UWOFA Librarians and Archivists are about to begin bargaining. All members will want to be watching closely and are being called on to support a successful process. 

UWOFA LA and the Employer are very close to completing the pre-bargaining Housekeeping process. We are pleased to report that it is going smoothly and quickly. In addition to the correction of typos, institutional name changes and revisions reflecting gender neutral terminology, we made numerous changes to align the Librarian and Archivist Collective Agreement with newly negotiated changes in the Faculty Collective Agreement. This has allowed our Negotiating team to achieve six bargaining goals while also improving additional processes and benefits.

Notable gains include:

• Investigative Reports are required to be supplied to Members (bargaining goal)
• The Employer is required to provide UWOFA with Member contact information (bargaining goal)
• The independent medical review process has been clarified (bargaining goal)
• The six months notice for Reduced Workload applications can be waived
• Access to online services and applications (including uwo.ca email addresses) will be maintained for Emeriti Members
• T2200 forms will be supplied if Members are required to work from home for five or more days a year, or are required to pay for work-related expenses without reimbursement (bargaining goal)

We have posted the signed off Housekeeping articles in a Bargaining Unit Member-only space. UWOFA-LA Members should contact a member of the Collective Bargaining Committee (CBC) to get access to this folder:

• Samuel Cassady
• Kristin Hoffmann
• Denise Horoky
• Erin Johnson
• Liz Mantz
• Brian McMillan
• Katya Pereyaslavska
• Stephen Spong
• Leslie Thomas
• Courtney Waugh
• Johanna Weststar

Bargaining will begin next week with the first meeting scheduled on Monday, May 15 from 2-4pm and subsequent meetings on May 16 from 1-4pm and May 19 from 9am-noon. 

Fund the Front Line

Members will also be wanting to watch what is happening in the post-Bill 124 landscape with collective bargaining in the province and UWOFA’s related Fund the Front Line campaign. 

Ontario hospital nurses were recently awarded additional pay after Bill 124 was struck down. We continue to urge our Employer to do the right thing and return to the bargaining table regarding Faculty compensation. We encourage members to direct their concerns about this to Western leadership. This pressure is effective as it has already resulted in the Provost’s approval of our proposal that the promotion bonus eligibility be extended to all Faculty members whose promotion to Associate or Full Professor takes effect as of July 1, 2023. 

Last week UWOFA members joined Western graduate students on International Workers’ Day for the Nation-wide walkout calling for additional federal research funding. I was inspired by the turn-out and encouraged to see growing intergenerational solidarity amongst various campus groups. 

We are better together and must commit to working together. If you haven’t done so already, please sign and send our letter to Western leadership, calling for them to reopen the negotiation of faculty salaries and to bargain a fair contract for Librarians and Archivists which redresses the wrongs of Bill 124.