YUFA
Executive
Agenda item # 3
Greatly complicating the upcoming round of bargaining is the issue of the ending of mandatory retirement. There are several possible approaches to this outlined below. The University of Toronto struck an agreement for ending mandatory retirement last Fall and YUFA has asked the Employer to consider the possibility of an immediate end to mandatory retirement before June 30, 2006.
The University of Toronto’s Faculty Association’s rationale for ending mandatory retirement included the following points: Mandatory retirement...
1. impedes U of T's efforts to be competitive;
2. is discriminatory and imposes financial penalty on female faculty;
3. fails to recognize shortened working careers; and
4. represents loss of human capital and talent.
Details of UTFA’s agreement to end mandatory retirement are available at the following url: http://www.utfa.org/currentissues/1/Agreement-to-End-Mandatory-Retirement.pdf.
YUFA provided on its Website a statement on mandatory retirement, which can be viewed at http://www.yufa.org/retirees/mandatory.html. In that statement it was noted that mandatory retirement is a human rights issue, university faculty are able to continue effective employment beyond age 65, the ending of mandatory retirement should not impede the progression of young faculty into faculty ranks, and the economic costs are relatively small.
Possible ways for YUFA to end mandatory retirement
- negotiate changes to existing retirement provisions in current (2003-06) Collective Agreement, and negotiate a subsequent multi-year Collective Agreement for 2006+
- negotiate a one-year extension of the current (2003-06) Collective Agreement to include changes to existing retirement provisions and YUFA’s other most pressing issues for 2006-07
- negotiate changes to existing retirement provisions and other issues in YUFA’s next multi-year (2006+) Collective Agreement