Laurentian University does an 'about face' and requests 2 letters be unsealed

In what one observer has called an "about-face", Laurentian University has requested two letters protected under solicitor-client privilege be unsealed.

The Sudbury, Ont., university will make a motion in a hearing on Wednesday to request the courts make the two letters public.

The letters, which were between Laurentian and the Ministry of Colleges and Universities, are from late January 2021, just before the university filed for insolvency on Feb. 1 of that year.

Following its insolvency, Laurentian cut 69 programs in April 2021, and nearly 200 staff and faculty members lost their jobs.

Nickel Belt MPP France Gélinas said the request to unseal the letters is "a step to show goodwill" after even Ontario Auditor General Bonnie Lysyk and the province's Legislative Assembly were denied access to them.

Lysyk has prepared a report on the issues that led to Laurentian's financial problems. There is no set date, yet, for the report to be published.

In her "Preliminary Perspective on Laurentian University," which she submitted to the Legislature in April 2022, Lyskyk said Laurentian's capital expansions from 2010 to 2020, along with "poor management of its financial affairs," were big factors in its insolvency.

Letters leaked

Gélinas, who sits on the province's public accounts committee, said someone leaked the two letters to Lysyk so she could consider them for her report.

Gélinas added she has seen the letters, and while she could not go into details about their contents, she said they do not contain any bombshells for anyone who has been following the Laurentian saga closely.

"We are starting to know pretty well what has happened at Laurentian," she said.

But while the letters' contents might not be surprising, Gélinas says making the information public is a matter of principle and important, and would be a gesture of good faith from Laurentian.

She estimates the university has spent about $25 million on legal fees since it became insolvent.

"That would have been enough money to keep every program open," Gélinas said.

"Every worker, every teacher, every professor could have all stayed on for the money that was spent in legal fees."

Step in right direction

Eduardo Galiano-Riveros, a former Laurentian physics professor who lost his job during the cuts last April, said he was surprised to hear Laurentian had asked to unseal the two letters.

"It's an about face or a 180-degree turn for the Laurentian University administration," he said.

Galiano-Riveros said he has not seen the letters, but guessed they could reference a financial "lifeline" from the Ministry of Colleges and Universities, which Laurentian would have rejected to pursue creditor protection under the Companies' Creditors Arrangement Act (CCAA) instead.

But he added that was just conjecture.

Whatever they contain, he said the request to have the letters unsealed was a step in the right direction.

"In the narrative of it's a new day out, it's a new beginning, we're going to start doing things in a different way. So perhaps it is all part of that narrative," he said.