Ontario CUPE strike: Members gather outside Queen’s Park, Lecce’s office as government appeals to labour board over walkout
The latest Ontario schools news and the school strike from the GTA on Friday. This file will be updated throughout the day. Web links to longer stories if available.
9:50 a.m. As thousands of striking school support workers protest at Queen's Park and across the province, the government is before the labour relations board trying to put a stop to CUPE's job action.
Immediately following proclamation of the Keeping Students in Class Act (Thursday afternoon), we filed a submission to the Ontario Labour Relations Board in response to CUPE's illegal strike action," Education Minister Stephen Lecce said in a statement Friday morning.
A hearing began late Thursday - at 10 p.m. - and is to continue Friday afternoon.
Nothing matters more right now than getting all students back in the classroom and we will use every tool available to us to do so," Lecce also said.
Some 55,000 members of the Canadian Union of Public Employees walked off the job today after Premier Doug Ford's Progressive Conservatives rammed through controversial legislation overriding Charter rights and imposing a four-year contract on them.
Friday's strike has shut down schools in many, but not all, boards across the province where CUPE represents custodians, early childhood educators, educational assistants or child and youth workers, and kids are learning from home.
Read the full story from the Star's Kris Rushowy and Robert Benzie
9:30 a.m.: Many boards with staff represented by the union had previously said the CUPE strike would close their schools - including the Peel District School Board and the York Region District School Board, which account for the largest contingent of members.
The Toronto District School Board has said in-person learning will be cancelled as long as CUPE workers are off the job because it can't ensure schools will remain safe and clean for students.
The Toronto Catholic District School Board is also closing schools for in-person learning, as are Durham's public and Catholic boards, the Dufferin-Peel Catholic District School Board, the York Catholic District School Board and the Halton Catholic District School Board. Several other boards across the province have said they'll close schools on Friday because they can't operate safely without the CUPE workers.
Halton District School Board and Hamilton-Wentworth School Board will remain open, while Hamilton-Wentworth Catholic District School Board will be closed.
The MonAvenir Catholic School Board will close, and Conseil Scolaire Viamonde had not yet provided information on its plans to open or close schools in the event of a strike.
Read the full story from the Star's Alessia Passafiume
9:30 a.m.: Education Minister Stephen Lecce said the government filed a submission to the labour board immediately following the passage of the legislation Thursday night and proceedings are continuing Friday.
The law sets out fines for violating a prohibition on strikes for the life of the agreement of up to $4,000 per employee per day, while there are fines of up to $500,000 for the union.
CUPE plans to fight the fines, but at the end of the day, the union has said if it has to pay, it will pay. CUPE leaders have previously suggested that the union is looking for outside financial help from other labour groups.
The Canadian Press
8:15 a.m.: Members of CUPE and school supports workers have begun picketing outside Queen's Park in Toronto and Ontario Education Minister Stephen Lecce's office in King City, Ont., on Friday morning. Barriers have placed around the Ontario legislature, with many members carrying and wearing signs of support for education workers.
7:45 a.m.: Some 55,000 unionized Ontario school support workers are set to illegally strike Friday after Premier Doug Ford's Progressive Conservatives rammed through legislation overriding Charter rights and imposing a contract.
Despite hefty cash fines from Queen's Park, members of the Canadian Union of Public Employees are still planning to walk off the job, potentially closing thousands of schools across Ontario, and leaving parents and students scrambling.
All along we have said we will do whatever it takes to keep kids in class," Education Minister Stephen Lecce told reporters Thursday after mediated talks between the two sides collapsed.
This strike will be illegal and we will use every tool we have to end this disruption," added Lecce, referring to the $500,000 daily fines for the union and the $4,000-per-day penalty for unionized workers.
Read the full story from the Star's Kristin Rushowy and Robert Benzie.
From Thursday: Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and members of his cabinet railed against the Ontario government's pledge to use the notwithstanding clause to stave off legal challenges to a bill that would impact the rights of tens of thousands of education workers.
Using the notwithstanding clause to suspend workers' rights is wrong. I know that collective bargaining negotiations are sometimes difficult, but it has to happen. It has to be done in a respectful, thoughtful way at the bargaining table," Trudeau said Tuesday.
The suspension of people's rights is something that you should only do in the most exceptional circumstances, and I really hope that all politicians call out the overuse of the notwithstanding clause to suspend people's rights and freedoms."
The prime minister's comments came one day after Ontario Education Minister Stephen Lecce tabled the Keeping Students in Class Act," legislation designed to prevent a strike while imposing a four-year contract on 55,000 school support workers represented by the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE).
Read the full story by the Star's Raisa Patel.
From Thursday: Look, I'm a parent of three kids in Toronto school boards, and I really don't want to see their schools shut down due to a job action. Not for that, and not for any other reason. After the past few years we've had of interrupted classes and lost learning, it feels like another disrupted year is hard to swallow.
We're all fed up, and the prospect of anything again shuttering schools is frustrating, in the extreme.
But it hardly feels like the CUPE education workers - early childhood educators, administrators, custodians, support workers and so on - who were threatening job action as part of their labour negotiation with the province really ought to be seen as the source of that frustration at this point. This is a union whose members earn an average of $39,000 per year, which is less than a living wage in Toronto. My colleague Martin Regg Cohn's point that many of them earned more than that - the average includes part-time workers, and hourly average wages at the low end of their members' pay grid are about $25 an hour - is worth noting, as is his detailing of a dubious union negotiating strategy that began, and long stuck with, a demand for 11 per cent annual raises.
Read the full story by the Star's Edward Keenan.
From Thursday: Ontario's school support workers say they will walk off the job Friday if an agreement between the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) and the Ontario government is not reached. As a result, some school boards are temporarily shutting down while others are playing it by ear.
Here's the latest update on what many of the major school boards in the Greater Toronto and Hamilton Area have planned as of Tuesday evening.
Read the full story by the Star's Jamin Mike.
From Thursday: Ontario's government plans to invoke the controversial notwithstanding clause for the second time in Doug Ford's tenure and the province's history, this time to force school support staff on the verge of walking out Friday to stay at work.
The clause allows provinces to override certain parts of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms for five years. Ontario would use it to support legislation that could fine workers $4,000 and the union $500,000 every day if they strike.
Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) has said it will cover members' fines, which could total $220 million a day.
As announced by education minister Stephen Lecce on Monday, the Keeping Students in Class Act would also establish a four-year contract with the 55,000 Ontario school workers represented by CUPE.
Read the full story by the Star's Kevin Jiang.
From Thursday: They test the drinking water, repair ragged textbooks, track the safe arrival of every student, check the yards for tossed needles, supervise lunch and repeat lessons to kids who need help comprehending a teacher's instructions.
They are education workers. And there are 55,000 of them in Ontario represented by CUPE-OSBCU (Canadian Union of Public Employees and the Ontario School Boards Council of Unions) currently in tense contract negotiations with the province. They fall into some 600 job categories and their titles, responsibilities, hours and pay differ from board to board.
But what they have in common is that their work keeps schools open.
And in the wake of CUPE members vowing to walk off the job Friday, some school boards - including Toronto public and Catholic - have announced they will be shutting their doors for the day.