Province to appeal U of M faculty damages award ruling

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This article was published 18/05/2022 (1261 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The province has filed to appeal the recent court decision requiring it to pay the University of Manitoba Faculty Association more than $19.3 million in damages for government interference in 2016 salary negotiations.

In late February, a Court of Queen’s Bench judge ruled Manitoba should pay UMFA for wage increases that never materialized, as a result of its interference in bargaining talks at the Winnipeg-based university in 2016.

That award includes $15 million in one-time payments to academics who worked at the U of M from April 2016 and March 2020, $2.7 million to UMFA for strike-related costs, and $1.6 million for wages lost while picketing.

“Manitoba’s conduct significantly disrupted the balance between (U of M) and UMFA along with their relationship, as well as causing significant discord between UMFA and its membership. There was a serious and substantial undermining and interference with what had been a meaningful and productive process of collective bargaining,” Justice Joan McKelvey wrote in the ruling.

The Tory government had 30 days to appeal, starting April 22.

The UMFA received notice Wednesday afternoon, union president Orvie Dingwall told the Free Press.

“We were prepared for the government to appeal, but… we were really hoping that the government would just own its mistakes and its interference, and that it would just pay out the money and let everyone be able to move on,” she said.

Now, the union begins a legal waiting game.

The government has 45 days to submit its full appeal. UMFA lawyers will then have around a month to submit its response. Both will then wait until an appeals court judge is able to adjudicate the evidence.

“It’s likely dragging things out for continued months, if not into next year,” Dingwall said.

It is the largest damages award for a labour-related charter case in Canadian history, Dingwall said, adding based on that alone, she believed an appeal had been in the works.

“Really, my sense is that what they’re appealing is the size of the award — $19.4 million is obviously a very large amount of money. And so not having seen their evidence yet, it seems like they’re certainly not appealing the premise that there was harm done here and they were in the wrong. We suspect they’re simply appealing the size of the damages,” she said.

Manitoba Federation of Labour president Kevin Rebeck criticized the province’s decision as a tactic to mislead Manitobans and duck out of paying its bill.

“The Stefanson government is trying to delay paying the money that it owes to members of UMFA for damage this government caused. The PC party may have changed who sits in the premier’s chair (in 2021) but this government is exactly the same as it was under Brian Pallister,” he said Wednesday in a statement.

UMFA represents 1,265 full-time professors, instructors, and librarians at the U of M.

malak.abas@freepress.mb.ca