Who is Ogletree Deakins, YUFA’s Union-Busting Lawyers?

At our latest bargaining session on June 25th, CUPE 1281 staff employed at the York University Faculty Association (YUFA) made some movement on housekeeping items and explained our objections to a significant number of YUFA’s proposals. We called out the alarming direction YUFA is taking — hiring the international union-busting law firm Ogletree Deakins to restructure our workplace.

Ogletree Deakins is a well-known employer-side law firm that is notorious for undermining workers rights, including specializing in “union avoidance” (i.e. union busting) strategies, and pushing top-down corporate restructuring. That’s exactly what we’re seeing in YUFA’s proposals, which seek to gut protections against harassment, restrict union rights, and ram through management-heavy changes — all to create space for expensive new managers, while eroding the core values that define YUFA as an academic workplace union.

This approach marks a sharp and radical departure from YUFA’s own structures and principles. YUFA, as a union, has long championed democracy, equity, collegial governance, and solidarity. Yet their current approach abandons those values — sidelining staff voices, importing union-busting lead negotiators, and paving the way for corporate-style control over a small professional office of hardworking, dedicated staff. We are both perplexed and disappointed as to why YUFA is actively supporting a law firm known for union busting and advancing a global anti-worker agenda, and more recently, co-opting nonprofits and progressive organizations as a strategy to advance its goals.

The drastic changes being pushed are not only out of step with YUFA Executive’s stated principles, but are also at odds with YUFA’s own constitution and bylaws. They include proposals that YUFA staff have helped YUFA members fend off during recent rounds of bargaining with their own employer, the York University Board of Governors.

YUFA staff are proud CUPE 1281 members committed to advancing equity, dignity, and democratic workplaces. We reject this corporate-style attack on our rights and stand firm against rollbacks.

No to Ogletree Deakins union busting. No to concessions. No to top-down restructuring.

See the previous update for more information on YUFA sub-unit bargaining.

Register for CUPE 1281’s Annual Convention!

It’s time to register for the CUPE 1281 Convention! If you are elected as a delegate, an executive officer, or are a sub-unit steward, or if you intend to participate as a non-voting member, including as a retiree, please complete this registration form to confirm your attendance at Convention. If your sub-unit has not run an election yet to form a delegation, and has over 5 members, please do so as soon as possible.

Convention Details

This year’s annual convention will be held on Monday July 21, 2025, and will run from 10am to 5pm. Convention will be hybrid: in-person at the Workers Action Centre in Toronto, as well as virtual on Zoom. At our annual convention, sub-unit delegates of our local gather to receive reports from the executive committee, discuss new business items and elect the executive committee and convention and council delegates for the upcoming year.

YUFA Staff Sub-Unit Bargains for Equity and Job Security while Employer Tables Over 100 Proposals, Hires External Lawyers

On June 11, the staff at the York University Staff Association (YUFA), represented by CUPE 1281, presented a focused set of proposals to strengthen protections against harassment and discrimination, advance equity and job security, and prioritize health and safety. These workers fight for the rights of full-time faculty, librarians & archivists, and postdoctoral visitors at York University every day.

In an unprecedented move, YUFA has hired external legal counsel to lead their negotiations. In the first meeting between the parties, YUFA stated that bargaining negotiations should remain confidential and behind closed doors, a practice that YUFA itself does not exercise in recent bargaining rounds with their own employer, York University. It would also mean that their bargaining team would remain less accountable to their membership. CUPE 1281 made it clear that we cannot agree to confidential bargaining with media blackouts.

YUFA’s opening package contains over 100 aggressive proposals aimed at restructuring the workplace and weakening our union by splitting the bargaining unit, reducing our rights to participate in our union, stripping anti-harassment and discrimination protections, and reducing job security, among many others.

We are dismayed and disappointed, but CUPE 1281 is committed to collective bargaining and reaching a fair and respectful agreement at the table. We look forward to the next bargaining sessions on June 25, July 9, July 14 and July 28.

CUPE 1281 Emergency Resolution on Prison Labour

During CUPE Ontario Convention, the delegates from CUPE 1281 worked to bring forward an emergency resolution against the Canadian government’s plan to increase reliance on prison labour. Due to the fact that only one person, not from our local, was allowed to speak on the motion, the delegates wanted to share the following with CUPE 1281 members.

Mary-Jo Nadeau BDS Award Nominations Open!

For the seventh year, CUPE 1281 will be giving out the Mary-Jo Nadeau Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) Award. This monetary award of $500 is presented to an organization fighting to end support for Israel’s oppression of Palestinians and to pressure Israel to comply with international law. Anyone may nominate an organization for this award.

Selection criteria that will be taken into consideration include the following:

Local to where CUPE 1281 members work/live
Raises the voices of Palestinians in their struggle for self-determination

The deadline to nominate an organization is Monday, June 30, 2025.

If you are interested in nominating an organization, please fill out the Mary-Jo Nadeau BDS Award nomination form.

Save the Date! CUPE 1281 Annual Convention July 21

This year’s annual convention will be held on Monday July 21, 2025, and will run from 10am to 5pm. Convention will be hybrid: in-person at the Workers Action Center in Toronto, as well as virtually on Zoom. More information on registration and sub-unit delegate elections will be emailed out within the next couple of weeks.

If you are interested in learning more about our annual convention, and the obligations on the Executive and the Membership, please feel free to review the Convention section of the CUPE 1281 Bylaws (see pg. 12).

We apologize for any inconvenience that stems from our late announcement of the date. We encountered unexpected difficulty securing an in-person space.

We hope to see you there!

Justice for Dr. Helyeh Doutaghi

We, the CUPE 1281 Executive wish to express our unwavering solidarity with our member, Dr. Helyeh Doutaghi, an outspoken advocate for Palestinian rights who, on March 28, 2025, was unjustly and discriminatorily fired by Yale Law School.

Dr. Helyeh Doutaghi, who is an expert in Third World Approaches to International Law, has worked as the Deputy Director of the Law and Political Economy Project at Yale Law School since 2023. Dr. Doutaghi is a long-time supporter of Palestinian liberation, as well as a critic of Israel’s genocidal assault on Gaza and the West Bank. (any other details about her support for Palestine, activism, advocacy, academia)

On March 3, a right-wing Zionist AI bot called ‘Jewish Online’ published an article baselessly accusing her of being a “terrorist.” Accordingly, she was subjected to death threats, harassment, and vitriol by online trolls. The University, instead of supporting Dr. Doutaghi or engaging in due process, responded with suspension and a ban from campus. They have since terminated her, falsely claiming she was not cooperative in their clearly biased and presumptive investigative process.

In reality, it is the University that prevented Dr. Doutaghi from partaking in the investigation by: employing a lawyer and firm with ties to Israel, military defense companies, and the US State Department; demanding she meet their lawyer within only a few hours of suspension; refusing her request for more time to prepare even when expressed as a religious accommodation (as it was the month of Ramadan); and declining her request to see their questions in advance.

Proponents of Zionism have long pursued the tactic of labelling its critics as “terrorists.” Such claims are disproportionately used against Muslim activists like Dr. Doutaghi to silence their advocacy and deter others from speaking out. Ironically, the work that Dr. Doutaghi was hired to do at Yale focuses on a critique of laws and sanctions. To terminate her employment when that critique is directed at Israel speaks to the university’s bias, commitment to the Zionist project and its complicity in the genocide of the Palestinian people.

As CUPE 1281 Executive, are horrified by the suppression of Dr. Doutaghi, as well as hundreds of other activists like Mahmoud Khalil and Rümeysa Öztürk, who have lost their employment, education, citizenship status and freedom as a direct result of their commitment to the Palestinian cause. We condemn the actions of Yale Law School, Columbia University, and all other universities and colleges that have chosen the preservation of a violent supremacist ethnostate over their student and staff’s fundamental rights to freedom of speech and association.

We call on all members, the labour movement, and progressive organizations to support Dr. Helyeh Doutaghi. See the call to action here: End the Repression of Academic Freedom: Reinstate Dr. Doutaghi Now!

Campus Food Bank and Health Services at Risk as Employer Seeks to Roll Back Worker Rights

TORONTO–Workers at the University of Toronto Students Union (UTSU) may be on strike this month as they fight to protect family time and vital services for students, say members of CUPE 1281.

The workers plan Orientation, escalate health and dental claims, operate the only Food Bank on St. George Campus and facilitate a wide variety of other services and advocacy for undergraduate students.

“It’s really disappointing that the UTSU executive is letting this happen. A lot of them are involved with progressive organizations, but at the same time their organization is making the same sorts of attacks on workers and work/life balance that we see from corporate bosses,” said Marco Hernandez, a CUPE 1281 member who also runs the campus food bank.

The student union currently has five employees represented by CUPE 1281, which wrote to the Ontario Labour Relations Board on Monday night, setting a deadline for job action later this month.

Their employer’s concession demands have the potential to significantly affect workload and scheduling. Forty percent of the workers are parents, and these changes will negatively affect not only the workers, but their families as well.

“We work with students every day. We know and share their struggles and challenges and want to continue providing services they and the UTSU rely on. The employer has been pressing workers to take on multiple roles, which is bad for us, but also bad for the quality of services and programs for students,” said Wafiyah K, a CUPE 1281 member who helps connect students with a host of services.

The workers are calling on UTSU to drop their concession demands, respect the family and childcare responsibilities of workers, and provide a fair wage increase.

For more information, please contact:
Craig Saunders, CUPE Communications
416-576-7316

Toronto Social: March 21st 6pm!

GTA members! Save the date for the Toronto social on Friday March 21st, 6 pm, at The Ballroom Bowl (10 Dundas St East, steps from Dundas Station).

You can hang out and socialize or show off your bowling skills (or lack there of!), the choice is yours! We will have a dedicated space for our group, plus a few dedicated bowling lanes. Executives and staff members will be in attendance for you to speak with, and bowling, food, and your first drink are on us! We do need to give the bowling alley estimated numbers ahead of time, so please complete this short google form by February 24th if you are able to attend.

The venue is on the third floor and is wheelchair accessible. If you have any questions or concerns, please reach out to recordingsecretary@cupe1281.ca. Hope to see you there!

For members outside the GTA, keep an eye out for future social events, starting with an Ottawa social soon!

A Message from Christy McMorrow, Outgoing President

Hey everyone!

I’m very excited to be starting a new job this week working as an Organizer for CUPE 79’s bargaining campaign with the City of Toronto.

Sadly, this means I am having to step down as Local 1281 President. In my time as a CUPE 1281 member and Executive, I’ve learned so much from my fellow members and the Local’s staff team. 1281 and its members were a huge source of community to me when I moved to Toronto from the UK with very few contacts, and I’ve loved working with so many of you. I look forward to seeing 1281 continue fighting for our members and for a better world in the future!

In solidarity, Christy

Page 1 of 6
1
2
3
...
6
→