Support workers at Simon Fraser University have scheduled an all-out, all-campus withdrawal of services on November 7, and members of CUPE 3338 say picket lines will go up at all three SFU campuses.
This follows yesterday’s one-day walkout at SFU’s Burnaby campus and similarly scheduled actions today and this weekend at their downtown and Surrey campuses.
Support workers at other post-secondary schools have been able to negotiate collective agreements, including CUPE members at UBC, the University of Northern British Columbia and Thompson Rivers University. But CUPE 3338 says it has been unable to come to any sort of similar agreements.
“Only at SFU has the administration repeatedly refused to return to the bargaining table to reach a settlement,” said CUPE 3338 president Lynne Fowler. “They have been stalling for more than two years and we have had enough.”
Fowler said yesterday’s one-day strike will continue today at the Burnaby campus and the scheduled walkouts at the other two campuses will go ahead this weekend as planned.
She said union members are fully in support of the scheduled job action escalation.
“We met with administration this morning and they still won’t acknowledge the need to negotiate,” Fowler said Thursday. “They are feeling the heat, and we will continue to turn up that heat until they do the right thing.”
