Page Eight

The Retirees' Newsletter

The Retirees's Association ( Faculty, Librarian, Administrator), University of Windsor, Windsor, Ont. Canada

Vol IX, No.2 April 1999

EDITORIAL PAGE

How Will The New Pension Surplus Be Handled?

In the current contract (1998-2001), only 4.42 % of the $ 22.6 million of the pension surplus accrue to a few off the worse-case, minimum-guarantee retirees. In our judgment, this is a disproportionate and unjust distribution of a pension surplus.

An index of the unfairness is that by about February, 2002, there will be employees at this University, hired since 1996, who will have enjoyed a pay increase (= a pension-payment holiday) for up to 5 ½ years, financed out of our pension Plan. That means that they will not have paid a cent from earned income into our jointly shared pension Plan over a 5½ -year period, At the same time, there are minimum-guarantee retirees who have never had a pension holiday, and who are receiving pension increments, modest at best, that are nothing like the percentage-increases currently enjoyed by active faculty and librarians. One wants to ask if we are still talking about the same pension plan.

Repeatedly, we protested these pension-benefits provisions to our own Faculty Association which is legally mandated to negotiate on our behalf. We protested before and during the last set of negotiations. We were ignored. A group of eight retirees formally grieved against the University of Windsor through the Faculty Association Grievance Committee (Article D14). Our grievance explicitly signaled the failure of the University to establish a Retired Members Pension Committee to examine "the adequacy of the retirement benefits provided by the University," and to file recommendations (all this under Article D7)

Our argument is that if the D7 Committee had met, it could/would have diagnosed inadequacy in the area of excess-surplus distribution (already implemented during the 1996-98 period), and made suitable recommendations. Our grievance was turned down. We then appealed both to the Faculty Association Executive, and to the larger Association Council. Both appeals were turned down, the second narrowly.

We realize, of course, that our future fortunes depend very much on our voice being heeded at the right time, in the right places. To this end, WURA (Windsor University Retirees' Association) is in the process of applying to the Faculty Association for exclusive recognition as the body representing University of Windsor retired faculty, librarians and "certain others " (from administration). We are also, within a Task Force, pursuing voting representation on Faculty Association Contract and Executive Committees, and a consultative presence on the Negotiating Committee.

WURA representatives are also members of the recently established--finally--Retired Members Pension Committee (stipulated in Article D7) to which we have just submitted a list of themes and topics for discussion. At this stage we have not yet decided if we will appeal, in terms of negligence and bad faith, against our own Faculty Association to the Ontario Labor Relations Board.

We suspect that the Faculty Association, as it resumes negotiations over this latest surplus installment, will want to adhere to the same unjust proportions. Until we in WURA have negotiated improved representation on the Faculty Association and its Contract Committee, we do not believe that we will receive just treatment from them in the area of pension benefits. We believe that the University itself, which most of us served between 30 to 40 years, may be more attentive to our cause.

Datta Pillay

The Association

The Retirees' Association (Faculty,Librarian, Administrator) at Windsor was formed in 1990, to give a unified voice to retirees; to provide a bridge for communication with the University; to encourage social contact among the retirees; and to open a few doors through which retirees could continue to contribute to the University of Windsor.

Thus the Association is meant to fill what could otherwise be a void in the lives of retirees - possible isolation from the University and from their former colleagues; and possible lack of understanding of vital pension and health issues that affect them directly.

There are only two meetings of the full membership per year: in the spring and the fall. An informal social committee arranges several other events per year - dinners, plays, picnics, and so on -all of which are paid for by those who take part. The Association encourages smaller special interest groups to form as occasion and their interests warrant. Because of extreme economy of operation, dues have been kept at the level of $10 per year. This includes five issues of The Retirees' Newsletter .

Officers of the Association are:

President: Stan Cunningham
Secretary: Datta Pillay
Treasurer & Membership: Phyllis Nolan