University of Western Ontario Staff Association

The McGuinty Government released its budget for the 2010-11 year last week, and it contains some modestly good news for universities. There is some new money for post-secondary institutions - $310M to fund 20,000 new student spaces (though the truth of the funding increase has been questioned by the CCPA’s Hugh McKenzie). However, this apparent increase in funding is overshadowed by the Liberal Government's announcement of a public sector wage restraint program.

The Government is freezing the wages of non-union public sector employees for two years. While this does not affect UWOSA members directly – unionized employees are exempt from the Act – the McGuinty Government has said that it will “work with” unions and employers to bargain new agreements with no net increase in compensation. It is not clear what he means by this, but the legislation enacting the wage freeze is clear in exempting unionized employees. There will, we assume, be increased pressure at the bargaining table for UWOSA and other public sector unions.

While we are relieved that the wage freeze does not appear to apply to us, we nonetheless deplore it. The McGuinty Government, at the same time it is dramatically increasing the tax burden by implementing the HST, is freezing the wages of hundreds of thousands of low and middle income Ontarians who cannot afford it. And, at the same time, the Government will proceed with previously planned corporate tax cuts. So working people will be asked to make dramatic cuts to their standard of living while corporate taxes go down. Working Ontarians – public servants or not – should not be paying for corporate tax cuts.

There is a wage freeze which we could support, though. This restraint program will see the salaries of executives in the public sector frozen too. Or will they? There is an exception for “additional benefits” for “performance” if part of the “compensation plan” as it existed at the time the budget was tabled. This sounds an awful like protection for Executive bonus plans during the restraint. If so, this is inexcusable. These are the people who can afford to make the sacrifices McGuinty is demanding of working people.

This budget appears to put more money in the hands of universities, and that is a good thing. However, McGuinty’s ill-advised public sector wage restraint program is a disaster which needs to be rethought. Perhaps Mr. McGuinty needs to have a chat with former premier Bob Rae? Mr. Rae, no doubt, can provide advice about what happens to premiers who implement wage restraint.