Panel finds vice-chief violated collective agreement

An arbitration panel has partially upheld a grievance against the First Nations University of Canada (FNUC) filed by Dr. Blair Stonechild, a professor in the school's Indigenous studies department.

Stonechild filed the grievance with the University of Regina Faculty Association (URFA) which also represents the faculty at FNUC, claiming his academic freedom had been violated when his speech was dropped from the agenda of a national symposium on post-secondary education organized by the Assembly of First Nations and held at FNUC in April 2005. In his grievance, Stonechild maintained he was removed from the conference because of concerns voiced by Federation of Saskatchewan Indian Nations (FSIN) Vice-chief Morley Watson, chair of FNUC's board, who allegedly spoke about his anger with Stonechild during an April board meeting and suggested his problems with Stonechild should impact the decision to have Stonechild present at the conference.

Stonechild had been one of the faculty members who publicly criticized Watson's actions in February 2005 when three senior administrators were suspended and copies were made of computer files located on the university's central server drive.

While it found that the university wasn't guilty of direct interference in the case, the arbitration panel ruled that, by making statements suggesting that Stonechild shouldn't be allowed to participate in the conference, Watson had failed to defend Stonechild's academic freedom, putting him in violation of the faculty's collective agreement.

Shortly after the arbitration panel made its decision known, the university released a copy of the decision, along with a statement claiming victory in the matter based on the fact that the panel didn't find the university itself in violation of the collective agreement. The university has now seemingly reversed its interpretation and has announced plans to request a judicial review of the panel's findings.

By going after a review, the university is prolonging a process that has already dragged on for more than a year, said URFA chair Dorothy Lane,.

"It stalls the process and it is a very negative outcome, I think, for us because certainly we want to see some resolution and we want to see, ultimately, some resolution and remedy for our member," Lane said. If the university goes ahead with its decision to request a judicial review, that request will have to go to Court of Queen's Bench to determine if grounds for a review exist.
"Usually there has to be an error in law, a problem with the way the panel came to its findings," Lane said.

Until a decision is made as to whether or not FNUC's appeal will go forward, the second part of the grievance process, where the issue of damages and of remedying the situation, can't be dealt with.

"So it's not a very positive situation from our perspective, simply because it stalls the process," she said. "Dr. Stonechild filed this grievance back in May of 2005 and it's now September 2006, so that's quite a long time to wait."

Lane wondered if the university's decision to appeal the arbitration panel's ruling has anything to do with the upcoming review of the situation at FNUC by the Association of Universities and Colleges of Canada (AUCC), which is scheduled to take place sometime this fall.

"It may be that the First Nations University kind of wants to have this up in the air so that they don't have a finding," Lane said. "Obviously if they have a finding that they violated academic freedom then that's going to make it much harder for them with the AUCC."

A request for an interview about the arbitration panel's finding was placed through FNUC's communication department, but no response had been received by press time.