An Tricky Situation
Responding to a blog entry on SFU Students for Democracy, Vanessa Kelly, Treasurer of the Simon Fraser Student Society, speaks:
In essence, the Board of Directors is stuck in a quandary: if they continue to refuse to reveal to the membership the reasons behind their recent controversial decision, then the members will be unhappy and reach conclusions that the Board would be unhappy with. But if they break radio silence and tell all, then CUPE 5396 will file a grievance for breaking confidentiality!
And so the (implied) response of the Board of Directors to the membership is simply this: "Trust us."
Unfortunately, I am sceptical. The fact is, many similar situations have happened at other student unions in Canada in recent years, under highly suspicious circumstances. OUCSAK (now known as UBC Students' Union-Okanagan) replaced its General Manager shortly after the CFS partisans took over; similarly at the Ryerson Students' Union. The same was true at the University of Saskatchewan (and shortly thereafter, a notebook was discovered documenting a conspiracy to "purge staff" and "replace" them with "good staff - CFS").
Most notoriously, UBC Alma Mater Society General Manager Bernie Peets was abruptly fired in December 2004, in a secret decision of the Executive Committee, over concerns with a different CFS service - Travel CUTS. The Executive Committee of the AMS tried as hard as they could to keep the issue as quiet as possible, warning Council members to speak nothing about the issue. They even brought in a lawyer whom they (incorrectly) claimed was a specialist in the removal of general managers - Don Crane (!) - neglecting to mention Mr. Crane's close connections to the Canadian Federation of Students (and lack of specialized experience in general-manager removal).
Now, it is entirely possible that the recent decision made today at SFU has no relation to these decisions at other student unions. But I think that I am perfectly within my rights to be suspicious of what has happened today. The Board of Directors must give us something better than just "trust us."
Responding to a blog entry on SFU Students for Democracy, Vanessa Kelly, Treasurer of the Simon Fraser Student Society, speaks:
I would also like a chance to quote article 7(c) of the collective agreement between CUPE 5396 and the SFSS:This comment mirrors a statement on her personal blog:
Confidential Information Reporting: The employer shall not give any confidential information about an employee to ANYONE without the permission of the employee concerned. The Employer shall restrict the transfer of all information related to the matter to seated members of the Board of Directors. If discussion is necessary in a meeting of the Board of Directors, it shall be "in camera"...
I'll tell you everything you want to know as soon as I'm allowed. Until then I would like to impress that this has will have ZERO impact on the Grad Health Plan. Grads make that decision, not me.
These comments - which to date are (to my knowledge) the only written statements of any of the members of the Powers That Be - deserve a proper response.Message to the Membership
As of Wednesday, July 26, 2006, the Simon Fraser Student Society has been conducting an internal investigation. To ensure a smooth and thorough process, seven staff members were asked to go on paid leave for a period of four working days. I apologize for any inconvenience that may have resulted from this absence. However, this investigation was necessary.
The results of the investigation cannot, at this time, be disclosed in respect for the individual(s) involved. In addition, I have been advised by legal council [sic] not to disclose the findings of this investigation.
Again, I apologize for any inconvenience this investigation has caused.
In essence, the Board of Directors is stuck in a quandary: if they continue to refuse to reveal to the membership the reasons behind their recent controversial decision, then the members will be unhappy and reach conclusions that the Board would be unhappy with. But if they break radio silence and tell all, then CUPE 5396 will file a grievance for breaking confidentiality!
And so the (implied) response of the Board of Directors to the membership is simply this: "Trust us."
Unfortunately, I am sceptical. The fact is, many similar situations have happened at other student unions in Canada in recent years, under highly suspicious circumstances. OUCSAK (now known as UBC Students' Union-Okanagan) replaced its General Manager shortly after the CFS partisans took over; similarly at the Ryerson Students' Union. The same was true at the University of Saskatchewan (and shortly thereafter, a notebook was discovered documenting a conspiracy to "purge staff" and "replace" them with "good staff - CFS").
Most notoriously, UBC Alma Mater Society General Manager Bernie Peets was abruptly fired in December 2004, in a secret decision of the Executive Committee, over concerns with a different CFS service - Travel CUTS. The Executive Committee of the AMS tried as hard as they could to keep the issue as quiet as possible, warning Council members to speak nothing about the issue. They even brought in a lawyer whom they (incorrectly) claimed was a specialist in the removal of general managers - Don Crane (!) - neglecting to mention Mr. Crane's close connections to the Canadian Federation of Students (and lack of specialized experience in general-manager removal).
Now, it is entirely possible that the recent decision made today at SFU has no relation to these decisions at other student unions. But I think that I am perfectly within my rights to be suspicious of what has happened today. The Board of Directors must give us something better than just "trust us."
Labels: sfu
16 Comments:
Note the wording of Article 7 states that the Employer shall not divulge information to anyone without the permission of the staff person concerned.
Why not ask staff for permission to divulge? Note also there has been no staff consultation at all over "this issue".
Instead, the BoD says, "this issue" is confidential, and will remain so until this investigation is completed.
We were promised by Wei Li, the IRO, all would be "made clear" by Monday of this week. It is now Thursday, and we've been told that it will be an indeterminate period before all is "made clear".
I call BS. Secret trials aren't supposed to be legal in Canada (unless you're a terrorist) and the staff of CUPE 5396 deserve a hell of a lot better.
And we should note again that Wei Li has already violated this article of the CA by divulging names of those suspended.
Titus - read the rest of the comments there as well, eh? She promises to address any violations of the CA that she can - someone lists quite a few.
Isn't it all about respect?
The whole collective agreement everyone keeps quoting... the whole thing is just respecting the employer/employee union relationship. All this deception is obviously not going to fall into that, no matter how well planned and how carefully executed and with what help.
This whole thing is ill.
Forgive me if I've missed something, but which staff member out of the seven was let go?!
Hattie.
The board should not discuss this publicly. We shouldn't ask them to as we don't know the details.
I am not saying we should trust them or anyone, necessarily, but we should make sure the union is working to protect their members, and it certainly seems they are taking that on.
The board member who thinks they will be "making clear" what happened is wrong. I think we can expect one of the following:
Union negotiates with the employer for one of the following:
-lay off instead of firing so employee can get EI (this would be if the employee did do someting wrong but there was overreaction)
-reinstatement with compensation (where the employer was wrong)
-negotiated reinstatement
-golden handshake (where employer was wrong but employee does not wish to return to poisoned work environment)
-some combination of these
In all cases, I expect a confidentiality agreement would be signed forbidding union, employee and employer from discussing the case.
If the case is as the rumour mill suggests, and this is political (ie this staff person is not CFS enough for me zealotry) then we should hope this employee gets good compensation.
Unfortunately, whether we agree with them or not, the BoD does have the right to dictate policy, so if an employee refuses to follow instructions (ie. actively works against a plan to bring in a new health policy the board has decided on) then that is "insubordination" and generally cause for firing.
[Word to the wise, don't be insubordinate on your work computer or email! Because that all belongs to your employer.]
Expressing opinions contrary to the boss is not insubordination, however, and especially in student unions where the boss changes yearly, BoDs should be wary of being too quick to judge a staff person who has a history with a previous employer. It is no fun to go through dramatic "political climate chnage" in your workplace every 12 months and have policy change constantly to bend to a new BoD whim. Staff should be given leeway to complain a bit as long as they do their jobs.
I can imagine, for example, that were I a staff person asked to revamp or renegotiate a health plan that I thought was working fine, that is a lot of extra work that to me seems like it is for nothing, and I would be pissed of at having my workload quadruple for no good reason and complaining to coworkers over beer fairly often.
Ah well, it is good training to go into real government jobs. Fund something one year, the cut the budget the next.
nonny, Q: where does compensation come from? A: Student pockets. Same with money spent on lawyers, etc.
Why? Because BoD didn't try to solve the issue informally. (or they might have some intentions, aka CFS positions)
btw, Is there anyway to sue BoD members personally for the loss because of mismangement?
There was a similar incident at Students' Association of Grant MacEwan College a few years ago. I was a reporter for the school newspaper at the time, and attended the meeting where not even the board was given any information on what had happened, only the student executives were privy to information associated with the departure of the General Manager. The board did nothing about it but ask questions that weren't answered, and the students did less.
An organization whose political direction shifts dramatically every year is an organization whose structure needs changing. But bad structures should be changed, not ignored. In my experience, student executives don't make these kinds of decisions lightly. And frankly, it doesn't matter what the student governors wanted to accomplish, if staff are frustrating the process, they should go.
But a students' association cannot deal with the potential legal costs of letting someone go without cause, or letting someone go with cause and thereby risking defamation. This is particularly true with unionized employees. So they hire lawyers to set up agreements whereby no one says anything about it, and the person just leaves. It maintaints the authority of students to run their organization and minimizes legal risks at a cost to openness and transparency.
Whether the cost was worth it is for the students to decide.
I agree, with Anonymous's response to my post--yes a prudent student union attempts to resolve any conflict with their staff with dialogue first. That is always the best choice for management, or life really, just based on principles of respect and to ensure the best environment in the long term.
If dialogue does not work, then progressive discipline would be the next step.
However, sometimes (and I am not AT ALL suggesting this is the case at SFSS because I have no idea other than the gossip), but sometimes staff really do need to be fired. In a case of theft, for example, or if someone assaults a coworker.
Sometimes employers need to consult a lawyer to make sure they act properly, and if they did need to fire someone (someone stole from the society for example) to make sure they do it properly and don't end up with the thief still on staff! And sometimes they don't know if someone should be fired and need advice. And yes that lawyer costs money.
What would really cost a student union money is firing someone impulsively without talking to their lawyer, and then spending way more money on a lawyer when they are sued for wrongful dismissal.
A prudent student union (any employer in fact) has discretionary funds set aside for things like legal advice, or paying maternity leave benefits.
Can you sue your student union for wasting money? Not sure. You could sue any non-profit board for fraud. And employee could sue if they were fired for their political beleifs.
I a disturbed by Gauntlet's account of a board not knowing the details. usually the board is the higher body and would be privy to any personnel issue, but the student media, of course, would not.
I agree that organizations (or the BC government hahah) lurching from left to right is often wasteful and unproductive (even though I certainly favour one end of the lurching spectrum myself). However, it is the nature of the beast if you are fighting over real issues, because the issues really matter and because different approaches do really benefit different ideologies.
With student unions, when one goes for "stability" you can easily end up with a really lame organization that employs far too many people to organize dances and pub crawls, which really could be done by a social club, and takes no position on anything political ever in an effort to maintain the status quo. Why bother?
Welcome to the CFSers!
Yes, the pattern of CFSers firing staff as nothing to do with the fact that it is only CFSers firing staff.
Just like the pattern of rain coming out of clouds has nothing to do with the fact that it only rains when there are clouds.
You all should check out http://www.qp.gov.bc.ca/statreg/stat/S/96433_01.htm#part3, which is where you would, if you wanted to, find the British Columbia Society Act. Check out the parts, particularly, starting at s. 25, about duties of directors, acting in good faith, negligence, and so on.
To put a finer point on this: it all seems (without jumping to conclusions) that at least some Board members are at risk of breaking the law, and they might be interested to know that they are not protected from being held personally responsible.
Also, I think this is all a big scam to get a quorate AGM.
Titus rocks. This was not written by Titus.
I'm pretty sure they don't want a quorate AGM this year.
Check this site out: http://blog.sfssdemocracynow.ca/
Lots of student unions fire staff over a whole range of issues every day. When staff are not lucky enough to be unionized, they can get fired over mere personality clashes. We really don't know why this person was fired, do we?
Her blog post has mysteriously disapeared.
Yes, people do get fired for somthing as trivial as personality clashes, ven unionised staff sometimes, although hopefully they will seek remedy.
Should staff be fired for having "the wrong political opinion" they are protected by the Human Rights Code, but just try to get through that process in time to save your job! I am not even sure their is a Human Rights Office left since the cuts.
Does anybody has pics or catches of thevanessa blog?? I am really curious..
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