MOFA Statement: Bill 10 will not achieve its goals, gives the government too much unilateral power

13 May 2024

Winnipeg/Treaty 1 territory – The Manitoba Organization of Faculty Associations (MOFA) expresses its grave concern about Bill 10, The Advanced Education Administration Amendment Act, which, if passed, would not achieve its goals and would dangerously increase the power of the government to make unilateral decisions detrimental to universities.

MOFA strongly supports the creation of and compliance with robust, survivor-centered sexual violence policies but the bill presents many problems not clearly directed at ensuring university boards and administrators deliver on their responsibilities to students and survivors. Bill 10 would grant the Minister of Advanced Education and Training the extraordinary power to singlehandedly reduce a post-secondary institution’s operating grant if they decided it was not in compliance with its duty to create and enforce sexual violence policies. MOFA is profoundly concerned by the lack of clarity in the bill on the procedures, processes, and review mechanisms that would allow the minister to invoke this extraordinary power.

“Not only is the bill silent on the criteria that would enable the Minister to unilaterally cut an operating grant, but it also enables a reduction of the grant to zero, thereby risking the closure of the institution. This would harm all faculty and students, including the very survivors who come forward when universities fail to comply with their own policies,” says Allison McCulloch, MOFA President.

MOFA urges the government to engage in a consultative process with students, faculty, administration, and experts on sexual violence before proceeding further, and urges the government to commit to its election promise to protect, not intrude on, university autonomy.

The Manitoba Organization of Faculty Associations (MOFA) is comprised of members of faculty associations from Brandon University, Université de Saint-Boniface, University of Manitoba, and the University of Winnipeg representing over 1,600 individual academic staff. We are based on both Treaty 1 and Treaty 2 territories, and the homeland of the Métis Nation.