TSSU is escalating strike action to pickets on Thursday, June 15 starting at 7am and continuing through the day. This action is in response to SFU taking away our health benefits, a move to undermine our strike just as it begins. It is time to show the employer that we will not accept their treatment of the critical labour we provide the university and we deserve a fair contract by stopping working. Please read the following information carefully. We will be picketing the following locations and thus the work happening in these locations on June 15 will be struck work:
- Shrum Science Centre (C,B,P, and K)
- TASC 2
- South Science Building
- Science Road
- South Hallway on the 3rd floor of the AQ
If you work in one of these locations there will be a picket line that you should join and cannot cross. Come to campus as normal and you will be directed to picket headquarters. If you do not work in any of these locations but have a flexible schedule, you should show up to join the line for maximum impact. At this time the picket is only for June 15 at these locations, at this time you should plan to return to normal duties on June 16.
TSSU bylaws are clear that no member shall:
- Perform any struck work, perform struck work for another if ordered to do so, or obscure the fact that another has done such work. Performing any work done in these locations on Thursday, June 15 from 7am onwards is crossing the picket line.
- Facilitate substitutions or in any way aid the administration/employer in getting said work done, i.e., by finding a substitute
- Notify the employer in advance of their willingness or unwillingness to cross a picket line, unless directed by the Strike Committee.
This means that you are not permitted to email your work supervisor or students and inform them that you are joining the picket or that class is cancelled. Students will come to class as normal, will be instructed not to cross the picket, and hopefully join the line instead. PIs and supervisors will be notified by administration.
Your participation in this strike is essential to improving our working conditions and our lives. This is not only about the low pay, the overwork, or having to constantly reapply for our jobs. It is about building a better university that considers the needs of its workers over the interests of its bloated administration class that make more in one month than we do in an entire year. Instead of working with us to address systemic problems, we are faced with concessions to our job security, to our international student health fee coverage, and pay that still does not keep up with inflation at the bargaining table. This is what is at stake tomorrow, and our solidarity out on the picket line is what will help us get the improvements we all deserve.
The University works because we do. It’s time to shut this place down.