Solidarity with U of O support staff workers

Jacques Frémont
President and Vice-Chancellor
University of Ottawa
550 Cumberland, Room 212
Ottawa ON K1N 6N5
president@uOttawa.ca

Bonjour Mr. Jacques Frémont,

First and foremost, I hope that you and your loved ones are doing well during these challenging times.

I am writing to you as the Regional Executive Vice-President for the Public Service Alliance of Canada, representing of over 48,000 workers in the National Capital Region—many of whom work in the academic sector in universities across the Outaouais region.

I am writing to express my strong support for PSUO-SSUO, the certified Bargaining Unit for 1300 administrative and support staff at the University of Ottawa. I am deeply concerned that your administration is trying to cut health benefits for support staff workers during the pandemic as they work tirelessly to keep the university running during these unprecedented times.

Administrative and support staff are frontline workers who have been essential in keeping our institutions running during this pandemic. This is not the time to be stripping them of their benefits and supports. These workers deserve respect and they deserve a fair contract.

As a former student at the University of Ottawa, I would hope that the university would hold itself to a higher standard than to cut health benefits for the workers you employ during a global pandemic. I would hope that your administration would aspire to live up to uOttawa’s stated core value of having a “Sustained Commitment to Our Community” as it pertains to the atmosphere you create as employers in the campus community. Does cutting health benefits during a pandemic live up to this commitment for the 1300 community members on strike right now?

I strongly urge your administration to respect workers’ rights and to go back to the bargaining table and negotiate a fair deal with PSUO-SSUO workers. It is the right thing to do.

Respectfully,

Alex Silas

PSAC-NCR Regional Executive Vice-President

cc: Marcelle Desmornes, President of PSUO.

mdesmornes@psuo-ssuo.ca