From Rob Rolfe,
Library Division Chair
I have contacted the City Librarian to express our shock and displeasure at the Library Management decision to allow the new Local 416 leadership to have an account and access to the TPL internal Groupwise email for the purpose of continuing their internal union dispute with the elected Library Division Executive. I told her this decision has badly damaged the relationship between Library Management and the Library Division union leaders.
Not surprisingly, this TPL Groupwise email account has been used by the Local 416 Executive (many of whom are appointed and not elected to their positions) for the purpose of distribution of flyers that are intended to undermine rank and file Library Workers' confidence in their own elected Library Division Executive officers and the Library Negotiating Committee.
Library Management, after telling us that TPL Management wanted to stay out of this internal Union dispute, has entered into a deal with one group of Local 416 leaders (none of whom are Library Workers, many of whom are appointed into their current positions) behind the backs of the elected Library Division Executive and Library Negotiating Committee.
For several months, the elected Library Division representatives on the Local 416 Executive Committee and Executive Board have been completely excluded from virtually every single Union decision affecting Library Workers.
Managers in TPL have now received these internal Union flyers attempting to undermine the elected Library Division leadership and Library Negotiating Committee members chosen by library workers. Inredibly, these flyers have been forwarded to every TPL Manager and excluded employee by our own Union!
This unscrupulous deal between the Local 416 leadership and Library Mangement puts the hard won rights of all Library Workers in jeopardy, just a we are about to begin collective bargaining. The fight to create a new Toronto Public Library Workers local is now not only a fight to have a voice in our own Union, but also to protect the right for Library Workers to choose our own Library Worker representatives to bargain on our own behalf.
The Library Negotiating Committee has just finshed preparing our bargaining proposals based on the many surveys completed by rank and file members in the Library, and now the elected Library Division Executive (which has always bargained for Library Division members) is under attack by our own Union working together with Library Management!
The CUPE National Constitution gives us a right as Library Workers to decide if we want to create our own separate CUPE local. For recommending that our members consider this question, which is our right, we have been treated like enemies of the Union by other 416 leaders, none of whom are Library Workers.
We have every right to consider this option, and CUPE has a duty to defend its own Constitution. As Library Workers, we have a right to fair representation. And CUPE has an obligation to allow our members to make this decision without Management interference or the current level of internal Union intimidation. Our right to a fair process under Article 3.8 of the CUPE National Constitution has now been further compromised and severely prejudiced.
I am angry and disappointed by these actions of a small group of individuals against my many friends and fellow trade unionists who helped to create and build this Union and its Library Division. I am also extremely confident that when we are able to speak to our own members without these types of interference, Library Workers will choose overwhelmingly to back the recommendation of their own elected Library Division leadership and Library Negotiating Committee.
