Special Renewable Contracts (SRCs) update
Seven of 18 YUFA members with special renewable contracts (SRCs) were to be renewed this week; four out of seven were informed on July 30 that their renewals were denied.
YUFA is filing grievances on behalf of the members, along with an Unfair Labour Practices complaint, since these denials occurred during bargaining when the terms of the agreement and members' working conditions should be honoured until either party is in either a strike or lockout position.
The members denied have been teaching in LAPS and Glendon. The Employer justified these denials of contracts "based on enrolment data and trend analysis" and various restructuring initiatives the Employer is undertaking which impact the number of sections available in courses offered in both Faculties (a process which YUFA has also grieved).
With this news, these YUFA SRC members could no longer be YUFA members as soon as January 1, 2025 and could be returning to CUPE 3903 to look for contract work. The remaining 11 SRC members whose contracts were to be renewed within the next 8 months are now feeling particularly precarious.
These denials are unprecedented in the history of this program. Since 1999, there have been various iterations of the SRC program and as far as YUFA staff and Chief Stewards are aware, YUFA SRC members have always been renewed upon request of the members and units; in fact, these renewals were described as pro forma and routine by employer representatives in a 2002 arbitration decision between YUFA and the Employer.
These members expected 13 years of job security in YUFA through the SRC program, at which point they could either retire (with various YUFA retiree entitlements) or go back into the CUPE 3903 pool to continue to teach.
YUFA members with Special Renewable Contracts (SRCs) have been long-serving members of CUPE 3903 Unit 2 with 20+ years of experience. The most recent group of 18 members applied to the SRC program in 2020 after it was reinstated by Arbitrator Hayes in 2018.
YUFA’s bargaining proposals for our renewal Collective Agreement include improvements to Appendix K, which covers SRCs.
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