Article by Kayla Hilstob and Enda Brophy
Kayla Hilstob, PhD Candidate, Simon Fraser University School of Communication, coordinator and researcher, Contract Worker Justice Counteracting Campus Precarity Research Project.
Enda Brophy is an Associate Professor, Simon Fraser University School of Communication, research lead of the Contract Worker Justice Counteracting Campus Precarity Research Project.
It takes much more than just teaching and research to make our universities work.
The Counteracting Campus Precarity research project begins from the conviction that for universities to produce the knowledge that can help us confront the most serious social problems of our time, our campuses must be kept clean and safe and our community must have food to eat.
All workers deserve security, dignity and a sense of belonging, but unfortunately that is not currently the case at Simon Fraser University (SFU).
Cleaning and food service work on campus is essential for keeping the university running, yet the workers tend to be unseen and underappreciated at the best of times.
Worse, many universities, like SFU, have contracted out cleaning and food service labour to large, for-profit companies. Contracting out these workers brings structural exclusion from the community, lower pay, access to fewer protections and benefits, abusive management practices and greater vulnerability to layoffs than other workers on campus.
“All workers deserve security, dignity and a sense of belonging.”
As with most precarious jobs, cleaning and food service work on campus is predominantly done by women, workers of colour and immigrants to Canada.
A part of the Understanding Precarity in BC SSHRC-funded partnership, our project was launched by researchers at SFU connected to the Contract Workers Justice @ SFU campaign (CWJ).
Launched in 2021, CWJ is fighting to bring this work in-house to make these workers full members of the university community who receive the same rights and benefits as others.
As part of the campaign, researchers investigated the effects of the pandemic on low-wage contract service at SFU, where food service workers were laid off and cleaners exposed to degrading and unsafe working conditions. The campaign has gained momentum over the last three years, with numerous rallies, public events, town halls and a petition to bring this work in-house which has secured over 1500 community signatories to date.
The campaign has been endorsed by every constituency on campus, by Burnaby-area MLAs, by the mayor of Burnaby and the entire Council, and by research institutes, unions and other labour organizations in Metro Vancouver. Our campaign and the stories of contracted out workers have made headlines in the CBC, Globe and Mail, The Tyee and more.
Inspired by traditions of worker inquiry, action research, history from below and feminist standpoint theory, the Counteracting Campus Precarity research project supports the goals of the coalition, producing knowledge that brings public attention to the working conditions of SFU’s contracted-out workforce.
The lived experiences, demands and struggles of food and cleaning service workers on campus guide both our research and campaign work. In the spirit of the campaign’s cross-campus organizing effort, contract food and cleaning service workers are part of the research team, working alongside an interdisciplinary group of faculty and undergraduate, MA and PhD students.
“Bringing public attention to the working conditions of SFU’s contracted-out workforce.”
A key part of the research project involves gauging how experiences of service work vary between when it is performed in-house and when it is contracted out. Fortunately we don’t need to look far for answers as there are excellent comparables for analysis right here in British Columbia.
Project researchers conducted a focus group with members of the Hospital Employees Union, whose work was first contracted out by the BC Liberal government in the 2000s and brought in-house by the BC NDP in 2019. We learned of life-changing transformations for workers brought back into direct employment in health care, including a greater sense of belonging in the broader workplace community and a significant decrease in managerial bullying on the job.
An even more telling case for comparison is that of directly employed food and cleaning service workers at the University of BC and University Victoria. The Counteracting Campus Precarity project will compare their working conditions and experiences to those of SFU contract workers in similar occupational categories.
The research project also involves an ongoing survey of collective agreements secured by unions representing food and cleaning service workers on all three campuses, providing another point of comparison among in-house and contract workers.
Despite their structural exclusion from the university community, the experiences of service workers should matter to all of us at SFU and the CWJ campaign strives to offer useful insights for others considering cross-campus organizing efforts to bring workers in-house at public post-secondary institutions.
“The campaign and research activities have made a difference for workers on campus.”
The Counteracting Campus Precarity research team is documenting the history of contract work on campus, the activities of the CWJ campaign and the experiences of workers participating in it. Materials gathered in documenting the campaign and in interviews with contract food and cleaning services workers will be deposited in the Contract Worker Justice Archive, a project being developed in collaboration with the SFUFA members working at SFU Archives. Through the CWJA, the experiences of SFU contract workers will find their rightful place in the public records of our community, documenting the changing composition of this workforce, the indignities they have suffered, but also their long history of fighting back.
The CWJ campaign and its research activities have made a difference for workers on campus. For instance, in 2021 cleaning workers at SFU were paid as low as $15.67 hourly and for food service workers that number was as low as $14.93, significantly less than the 2021 Metro Vancouver living wage of $20.52.
In 2022 the administration announced it would seek to become a living wage employer and grant contract workers access to university benefits and services such as the gym, library and even daycare access and subsidized tuition for workers and their families. While implementation of these changes has been inadequate and no living wage certification has been issued yet, workers have seen a difference on their paycheques.
Organized community support for food service and cleaning workers provided additional leverage at the bargaining table in 2023 and in 2024 most food service and cleaning workers met the threshold of a living wage in Metro Vancouver. Contract workers also now have access to the benefits the university promised, like subsidized tuition, a major victory for the campaign.
SFU administration has signaled that austerity budgets will continue, citing the new government cap on international students and underfunding of post-secondary education. Fighting alongside the most precarious workers on campus is more important than ever because these workers remain contracted out.
In the context of a large university with immense resources, budgetary choices are a matter of priorities. The CWJ campaign and its research arm, the Counteracting Campus Precarity project, will continue to conduct research to advocate and fight for insourcing this work because if we want a healthy campus, the rights of food service and cleaning workers at SFU must be a priority.
