U of L concerned about impact of ongoing strike

The University of Lethbridge says it’s concerned about the impacts of the ongoing strike by its faculty.

In a weekend statement, the university said, since 2019-20, its provincial grant has been cut my more than 20 per cent and as a result the U of L has lost $20 million in annual funding from the province.

The statement said, in the past decade, faculty received 34 per cent raises through a collective agreement with the U of L.

Median salaries range between $108,000 and $178,000 per year for assistant, associate and full professors, says the U of L, with nearly 30 per cent of faculty earning between $140,000-$160,000 annually.

“During mediation in January, the university offered ULFA members more: 3.25% raises in addition to other raises faculty already receive for career progressions and merit. As a result, the university and ULFA were within a 1% salary gap,” says the university.

The statement said the faculty association’s demands “convey a misunderstanding of the institution’s financial situation and improper regard for students, other employees and the university’s long-term sustainability... Despite contrary claims, ULFA has refused repeated invitations to meet since Feb. 15 to discuss more reasonable salary demands. We continue to welcome ULFA to meet at the collective bargaining table for serious negotiations in the hopes of ending the ULFA strike and welcoming students back to class,” said the statement.

The university also says the ULFA used mediation as a pretext to strike, promising members that one wasn’t a certainty or would be short.

“The university cautioned a strike would be lengthy because of its inability to fund raises beyond 3.25%,” said the statement.

The chief negotiator for Mount Royal University’s faculty association said in a letter to The Herald on Saturday that the terms of the agreement reached there were misrepresented on the U of L’s website.

Kirk Niergarth included a letter he wrote to U of L president Mike Mahon which said a Feb. 24 bargaining update was inaccurate.

“The mediator’s report referenced in the update includes not only full-time salary increases (3.25%) but also a reorganization of our contract faculty salary grid, effective 1 May of this year that will result in immediate increases (ranging from 0.7-3.7%) for all contract faculty (approximately 50% of the membership). The report also includes a change to our benefits package effective upon ratification (with a value of up to $823/annum for 93% of full- time members and 45% of contract members). I think, however, that these specifics are less significant than the overall process that led us to an agreement,” said Niergarth in his letter.

“This was a difficult round, negotiated under unprecedented circumstances. We were able to reach agreement because both sides were willing to have rational, interestbased conversations with an eye to mutually-acceptable solutions.

“The more than 50 points of agreement achieved in our settlement — covering many areas including benefits, sabbaticals, workload, job security, equity, and, ultimately, compensation — required hundreds of hours of forthright, persistent bargaining in good faith. Crucially, this bargaining process involved engaging in a dialogue at the table in which both parties acknowledged and engaged with the other’s perspectives and arguments,” Niergarth wrote.

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