The University of Victoria (UVic) has fired one of its longest-serving professors after complaints he sexually harassed two women — including a graduate student.
In his 45 years at UVic, Robert Gifford pioneered the burgeoning field of environmental psychology — drawing students from around the world to study topics like climate change anxiety and the interplay between human beings and their surroundings.
But according to a pair of recent Labour Relations Board (LRB) decisions, the 78-year-old was fired last summer after an investigation found “repeated harm to junior scholars” and a “lack of accountability and understanding of [his] obligations as a senior scholar.”
The LRB documents detail a probe into “concerning behaviours,” citing an email Gifford sent a woman he first met when she was a “visiting student” — suggesting they share a hotel room while co-presenting a paper at a conference in 2018.
“This arrangement might require a bit of care in terms of other people who we know at the congress, but that can be managed,” Gifford wrote.
“And, of course, everything beyond the mere sharing of the room is to be decided on a completely mutual basis, at the time. How does that sound?”
In response, the woman — known as AB — told Gifford she wanted to remain “strictly professional.”
‘I made a clear mistake’
A member of the Royal Society of Canada, Gifford was a faculty member at the University of Victoria from July 1979 until he was fired in June 2024.
Gifford told the CBC on Wednesday he has been “devastated” by the firing.
He said he made a mistake sending the email about the hotel in 2018 after what he called “misinterpreting the drift” of a conversation with AB, but said he apologized at the time and was surprised to see his words used against him years later.
He said the other incident — which occurred in 2021 — involved a graduate student who had recently returned to the university grounds after COVID restrictions.
“And with that student, I made a clear mistake which was to say, ‘I’m attracted to you,'” he said.
“That was a mistake because she was a student, and probably, I shouldn’t have done that.”
Gifford said he was suspended following the 2021 incident but ultimately allowed to return to teaching until December 2023, when he was told he was being investigated in relation to the 2018 hotel email.
“So what I would like to emphasize is that had the 2018 incident come up in 2018, I never would have said to the student two years later, ‘I’m attracted to you’ because I would have kind of learned my lesson,” he said.
‘Mixed chances of success at arbitration’
Although Gifford was fired last summer, news of his termination was not made public until the labour board process, which the former professor initiated by challenging his faculty association’s decision not to pursue a grievance over his firing to arbitration.
According to the Labour Relations Board’s ruling, Gifford’s union claimed the university failed to provide “progressive discipline” and didn’t properly investigate the allegations against the professor — which the faculty association said were not “just cause” for firing.
“The union said he deserves some small punishment, but not termination. The university simply threw that away,” Gifford told the CBC.
The university rejected the union’s bid to overturn Gifford’s termination, and last August, the faculty association denied his request to take the grievance to arbitration after getting a legal opinion, which a union representative described to Gifford in an email.
“Their analysis of the case was that there were mixed chances of success at arbitration, and that reasonable arguments could be put forward for and against our case,” read the email, which is cited in the LRB decision.
“One concern they raised was your potential effectiveness as a witness, which would require consistently demonstrating an understanding of the power dynamics at play in this and the previous case, and in taking full responsibility for both events.”
‘Not a step we take lightly’
In its first decision on the case last May, Labour Relations Board vice-chair Rene-John Nicolas rejected Gifford’s contention the faculty association had made an arbitrary decision not to pursue his case.
In his ruling, Nicolas also said the university’s investigation was not flawed.
“I find the investigator ultimately came to their findings based on the undisputed emails between (Gifford) to AB,” Nicolas wrote.
“Those emails showed that the Applicant invited a junior colleague to share a hotel room with him and also invited that junior colleague to engage in sexual relations with him, to which the junior colleague said no because she only wanted a professional relationship with the Applicant.”
Last week, the board published a second decision, rejecting Gifford’s application for reconsideration of the earlier ruling.
Gifford told the CBC he is considering filing an application for judicial review in B.C. Supreme Court, but the cost may be prohibitive.
In a statement, the university wouldn’t comment on the allegations, citing privacy legislation, but said “terminating employment is not a step we take lightly and, when it happens, is indicative of the serious nature of the concerns raised.
“What we can share is that UVic is committed to providing an inclusive and respectful environment in which to work, learn and teach,” the university said.
“If there is behaviour by a UVic employee that is contrary to UVic’s policies and collective agreements, we want people to come forward so the circumstances can be addressed.”
