Mount Saint Vincent University staff vote overwhelmingly in favour of strike – Halifax

Staff members at Mount Saint Vincent University have overwhelmingly voted in favour of a strike mandate.

According to the Mount Saint Vincent University Faculty Association, which represents approximately 160 full-time faculty, librarians, and laboratory instructors, 97 per cent of members voted for the strike, with 99 per cent of members voting.

MSVUFA spokesperson Jeff MacLeod said the strike vote concluded last Friday, and the numbers are “highly significant.”

“It’s probably the highest strike vote that I can recall in my career,” he said. “By far, the vast majority of the faculty voted in favour.”

The MSVUFA contract expired at the end of June. The association is also looking to modernize its collective agreement, which is 35 years old.

MacLeod said the association wanted to start bargaining in May, but the school’s board of directors “dragged its feet” and a deal has yet to be reached.

“Bargaining typically happens in the summer,” he said.

He said, among other issues, the association is looking to increase compensation, but the school’s board of governors have “refused to engage meaningfully” financially and have yet to table its financial package.

“Here we are in December, and we don’t have a financial package even on the table,” he said.

“It’s impossible to come to an agreement when the other side refuses to discuss what is a core issue.”

Among the union’s other key asks were improvements to accessibility and inclusivity for Black and Indigenous students, but MacLeod said they’re getting “little traction” on those issues.

“One of our proposals that we thought would be fairly straightforward was just to include a land acknowledgement in the collective agreement, recognizing Indigeneity and the very land that we live on,” he said.

“And they won’t even agree to that.”

In a statement, MSVU spokesperson Gillian Batten said the strike vote at this point in the bargaining process “is not unexpected, nor does it mean that a strike is imminent or unavoidable.”

“We remain optimistic that an agreement can be reached,” she said.

Batten said the school agrees on “the need to update university processes and practices as part of our journey of reconciliation with Indigenous peoples and other marginalized populations.”

“We’ve proposed language that reflects that shared commitment,” she said.

“But given that negotiations are continuing, we don’t think it would be beneficial to the process at this point to discuss particular articles/items in greater detail.”

Meanwhile, MacLeod said the two sides plan to meet with a conciliator next month. If a deal isn’t reached then, a strike could happen in January or February.

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