An arbitration decision settling the dispute between the University of Toronto and its teaching assistants means that the workers are getting a new contract they initially turned down.

The settlement – released Monday – means 6,000 teaching and graduate assistants and contract instructors will be covered by a deal that boosts the minimum funding package to $17,500 from $15,000 in addition to other benefits.

In his decision, arbitrator William Kaplan said the deal reached on March 18 – the second one supported by the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) 3902’s bargaining committee – should be awarded without including the changes the union wanted.

That means the annual amount for the Tuition Assistance Fund will be $600,000 a year, retroactive to 2014-15. The Graduate Student Bursary Fund will also be retroactive at $1,045,000 a year.

CUPE 3902’s bargaining team had backed the tentative agreement, but it was narrowly turned down by its members – 1,101 to 992 – in a ratification vote.

At the time, critics voiced concerns that the wording of the offer didn’t guarantee this funding increase would apply to every member in the future, but only provide a lump sum to cover raises.

This was the second time CUPE 3902 members had voted against a contract being recommended by its bargaining committee in this round of contract negotiations.

Kaplan called the rejection of the contract “somewhat surprising” and pointed to the fact that while not all members of CUPE 3902’s bargaining team voted in favour of it, the majority did.

“They obviously believed it represented an appropriate and fair accommodation of interests,” Kaplan wrote.

The union was looking for changes that would see the minimum funding package protected in the union contract. Currently, employee compensation and graduate funding are separate – universities negotiate the wages of grad students who work for them.

The local said this “structural issue” wasn’t addressed in the March 18 tentative deal, meaning funding and precarious working conditions remained problems.

Kaplan wrote that while the contract might not “represent perfection,” it does include two new provisions around tuition and bursary funding.

“The March 18 memorandum may not represent perfection, but collective bargaining rarely achieves that from any perspective,” he said.

The 6,000 teaching assistants and course instructors were off the job for close to a month this winter over terms of a new contract.

The workers were sent back to their jobs after the union agreed to binding arbitration proposed by U of T president Meric Gertler.

U of T workers awarded contract originally rejected in arbitration decision

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