{"id":217242,"date":"2025-09-11T04:07:15","date_gmt":"2025-09-11T04:07:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/217242\/"},"modified":"2025-09-11T04:07:15","modified_gmt":"2025-09-11T04:07:15","slug":"thousands-of-ontario-public-college-staff-on-brink-of-strike-as-deadline-ticks-closer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/217242\/","title":{"rendered":"Thousands of Ontario public college staff on brink of strike as deadline ticks closer"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\t\t\tDescrease article font size<\/p>\n<p>\t\t\tIncrease article font size<\/p>\n<p>Some 10,000 support staff at Ontario\u2019s 24 publicly-funded colleges are on the brink of walking off the job as crunch talks continue toward a midnight strike deadline.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/70c8fc80.png\" alt=\"\" style=\"position:absolute;width:1px;height:1px\" referrerpolicy=\"no-referrer-when-downgrade\"\/><\/p>\n<p>Staff represented by the Ontario Public Service Employees Union have been bargaining for a new deal from the College Employer Council for months, but moved toward strike action in August.<\/p>\n<p>Key sticking points appear to relate to job security in the struggling college sector, where a massive reduction in the number of international students has hurt revenue, forced thousands of job cuts and closed campuses.<\/p>\n<p>Christine Kelsey, chair of the College Support Full-Time Bargaining Team, said talks would go until the midnight strike deadline if necessary.<\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t\t\t<img decoding=\"async\" width=\"170\" height=\"225\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/national.jpg\" alt=\"For news impacting Canada and around the world, sign up for breaking news alerts delivered directly to you when they happen.\"\/><\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t\t\tGet breaking National news<\/p>\n<p>For news impacting Canada and around the world, sign up for breaking news alerts delivered directly to you when they happen.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cCollege full-time support staff have been bargaining with our employer for months \u2014 today, we are bargaining up to a midnight strike deadline in a round that is, at its core, about job security,\u201d she wrote in a statement sent to Global News.<\/p>\n<p>Story continues below advertisement<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe are trying to stabilize the system \u2014 not just for this term, but for generations to come. We have yet to see any language from the employer on the table which actually protects jobs.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIf that doesn\u2019t change by midnight, 10,000 full-time support staff are ready to strike for the future of student support.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\n\t\tTrending Now\n\t<\/p>\n<ul class=\"l-inlineStories__posts c-posts c-posts--inline \">\n<li class=\"c-posts__item\">\n\t\t\t<a href=\"https:\/\/globalnews.ca\/news\/11407398\/charlie-kirk-right-wing-activist-and-trump-ally-shot-at-college-event-in-utah\/\" class=\"c-posts__inner\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t\t\t\t<img decoding=\"async\" class=\"c-posts__thumbnail\" src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/charlie-kirk-shooting.jpg\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"336\" height=\"224\" alt=\"\"\/><\/p>\n<p>\n\t\t\t\t\tCharlie Kirk dead after being shot at college event\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t<\/a>\n\t\t<\/li>\n<li class=\"c-posts__item\">\n\t\t\t<a href=\"https:\/\/globalnews.ca\/news\/11404303\/ukrainian-woman-iryna-zarutska-stabbed-attack-train-decarlos-brown-jr\/\" class=\"c-posts__inner\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t\t\t\t<img decoding=\"async\" class=\"c-posts__thumbnail\" src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/1757563635_523_Iryna-Zarutska-Decarlos-Brown-Jr.jpg\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"336\" height=\"224\" alt=\"\"\/><\/p>\n<p>\n\t\t\t\t\tUkrainian woman stabbed to death in unprovoked attack on N.C. train\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t<\/a>\n\t\t<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>The College Employer Council acknowledged questions from Global News but did not provide an update, adding that the teams were still in bargaining.<\/p>\n<p>Previously, the group \u2014 which negotiates on behalf of public colleges \u2014 has said the union\u2019s demands are unreasonable. Among the demands the College Employer Council previously said it could not accept was a promise not to close or merge campuses or reduce staff.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cOPSEU is ignoring the reality that college enrolment and revenues are down as much as 50 per cent,\u201d Graham Lloyd, CEO of the College Employer Council said in a Sept. 5 statement.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cNo organization managing a drop like this can commit to these out-of-touch demands. They go far beyond the scope of collective bargaining and threaten the sustainability of Ontario\u2019s college system.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The strike deadline is currently set for midnight.<\/p>\n<p>\n\t\t\tMore on Toronto<br \/>\n\t\t\tMore videos\n\t\t<\/p>\n<p>\n\t\t&amp;copy 2025 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Descrease article font size Increase article font size Some 10,000 support staff at Ontario\u2019s 24 publicly-funded colleges are&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":217243,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[2147,407,50,118614,118615,18404,80],"class_list":{"0":"post-217242","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-news","8":"tag-canada","9":"tag-education","10":"tag-news","11":"tag-ontario-colleges","12":"tag-ontario-colleges-strike","13":"tag-ontario-politics","14":"tag-politics"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115183698151157178","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/217242","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=217242"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/217242\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/217243"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=217242"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=217242"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=217242"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}