SACKVILLE, N.B. — Mount Allison’s professors and librarians are expected to head back to the negotiating table with the university in the new year as they continue to try and work out a new collective agreement.
A mediator has been appointed to help resolve the labour dispute following more than six months of talks and even after a provincially-appointed conciliator failed to help the two parties reach a deal by the end of November.
In its most recent online update on negotiations, the university stated it looks forward to mediation as a means of reaching new collective agreements in “an expedient manner” and both parties were in the process of discussing possible meeting dates.
“The university looks forward to the opportunity to resume negotiations beginning as early as possible in January.”
Talks will need to happen quickly, however, as dates have already been set for a strike vote for the Mount Allison Faculty Association, which represents 196 full and part-time faculty and librarians. MAFA has stated that, if a tentative agreement is not in hand by Jan. 20, it will hold a strike vote on Jan. 21 and Jan. 22.
MAFA president Matthew Litvak said last month that one of the faculty’s main issues of contention in the discussions is on faculty complement, or what he describes as “academic understaffing.”
He said this concern needs to be addressed in order to ensure the university can continue to deliver its academic programs at the high-quality level students have come to expect.
Negotiations began in June for a collective agreement that ended July 1, 2019.
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