Volume 28, No. 12                                               January, 1998

                              WHO'S NEXT?



In the weeks leading up to the Senate meeting on December 5, management

maintained that layoffs were going to be a one-time measure.  President

Van Loon emphasized this when he addressed General Faculty Board in

September (remember "We will not do this again"?) He repeated this in

subsequent press interviews.  And on December 5 he presented his cuts as

"the final step" to assure Carleton's future. 



Six days after Senate voted, Carleton's public relations office issued a

press release containing this statement: 



     "...there will be no further program closures for the purposes of

improving the bottom line. Any further changes would be for the purpose of

internal reallocation..." (CUASA's emphasis). 



This bolt from the blue was unquestionably at odds with the president's

public assurances.  For that reason, CUASA's president wrote to President

Van Loon and asked him for a formal undertaking that he and his

administration would not seek to lay-off more academic staff.  Peter

Fitzgerald stressed that such an undertaking would be in complete

conformity with the president's earlier statements and would not require

him to agree to anything he had not already committed himself to. 



Note that we were not asking for a memorandum of understanding or an

undertaking that would be grievable under our collective agreement.  CUASA

understands that all future contingencies cannot be ensured against, and

we deliberately steered clear of anything that might raise legal

objections.  All we wanted was a straightforward statement of intent. 



The president's initial reply acknowledged his earlier assurances but fell

short of the straightforward statement we were seeking.  So we requested

clarification.  Three hours before the CUASA general meeting on January

16, Peter Fitzgerald received a fax with this statement: 



     "You should read my response precisely as it was worded.  To gain a

full appreciation of these assurances it is important that anyone

interested read them in the full context in which they were given."



The president's message is a real disappointment.  He chose to reply in a

lawyerly way, saying, in effect, read the fine print.  He is not willing

to have his own assurances interpreted as a straightforward commitment not

to seek more layoffs of academic staff. 

  

In the month-long negotiations following Senate's vote, management made

clear that their primary goal was a fast-track process for imposing

layoffs.  In those same negotiations they categorically refused CUASA's

alternative proposal to effect the same dollar savings without imposing

layoffs.  Meanwhile the public relations office set out the rationale for

"further changes".  Now we learn that the president's assurances of no

future layoffs actually need to be understood in their "full context". 



So, you tell us: Do you see a pattern here?