Former Guelph-Humber instructor Paul Finlayson seeks a public correction and challenges a dismissal that relied partly on treating his human rights complaint as reprisal.
PRESS RELEASE — OCTOBER 6, 2026
Former University of Guelph-Humber instructor Paul Finlayson is calling on Humber College and the University of Guelph to publicly correct damaging accusations about him, saying continuing restrictions prevent him from contacting the students who need to hear the correction.
Humber confirmed privately that an assault allegation against Finlayson had been investigated and found unsubstantiated. Its written acknowledgment reached him more than two years after his November 27, 2023 suspension. Finlayson says no public correction has followed.
“The institutions have communication channels I do not have, and I remain prohibited from contacting students myself,” Finlayson said. “They cannot leave the accusation uncorrected publicly, restrict my ability to answer it, and then leave me responsible for repairing the damage they intentionally caused.”
The University of Guelph and Humber are the partner institutions behind the University of Guelph-Humber, where Finlayson taught.
He says he retains written communications documenting three claims repeated by staff following his suspension:
That he assaulted a student, ripped the student’s shirt, was handcuffed and led away.
That he had a five-year criminal history and the institution had been trying to remove him for five years.
That senior management had decided he would be terminated “no matter what,” and that the vice-provost had described his comments condemning Hamas as “disgusting.”
Finlayson unequivocally denies the assault, arrest and criminal-history accusations. No evidence was ever brought forward. He was the top-rated professor in the Business Department.
He says the third statement raises a separate concern: that his dismissal was presented as predetermined before the so-called investigation had run its course.
“These accusations were false, and the damage was devastating,” Finlayson said.
“I watched my reputation being destroyed and repeatedly asked management to intervene. The management of the U of Guelph and Humber College are, in my opinion, deeply institutionally anti-Semitic, and the defamation was designed to poison the work environment. They wanted it to run.
I was never allowed a defence, the appeals went unread, the adjudication hearing was cancelled, and my union, which took $15,000 from me in dues and was legally mandated to represent me, refused to represent me.
Finlayson said that OPSEU has publicly attacked Israel and that his pro-Israel position was incompatible with their prejudices. He said they strangely had no problem with a union executive who wished she was alive when Hitler was committing genocide so that she might have participated in the genocide.
Finlayson alleges that the accusations originated from senior management. He points to screenshots and accounts from five students identifying Humber employee Vashti Bagot as the source of repeated accusations, with her attributing her source to senior management.
A student whom Finlayson has known for approximately ten years supplied screenshots of staff members trying to convince students of Finlayson’s apparent criminality via text. (See below).
“My student friend described the lies as becoming accepted wisdom,” Finlayson said. “I have had ex-colleagues and students cross the street when they see me. It’s no surprise they think the worst - students heard these statements from staff, with information attributed to senior management. That gave them apparent institutional authority.”
Finlayson says he sought intervention at least twice within the first month following his suspension. In correspondence about statements by faculty, interim business program head Jerry Chomyn refused to address the defamation.
Finlayson says no public correction followed. After he asked Bagot to stop repeating the accusations, he says Humber Public Safety Manager Nancy Deason threatened him in writing that further contact of that kind could result in criminal harassment charges.
Ontario’s Workplace Safety and Insurance Board reviewed correspondence and interviewed students. Its June 13, 2024 decision records their accounts of hearing that Finlayson had assaulted a student and been removed from campus. They also reported that an internal management source told them he might be terminated because of this.
The decision stated:
“There is no evidence, or any documentation submitted to prove that you have assaulted a student by ripping off their shirt. (Or that you were handcuffed and arrested).”
WSIB described the spreading of the assault accusations as “vexatious, egregious, and abusive” and identified their impact as “the predominant cause of your mental stress injury.” Its June 20 addendum approved healthcare benefits for work-related post-traumatic stress disorder.
Finlayson says he received threatening messages at home, that his family was affected, and that he had to install additional security equipment. His February 2025 correspondence documented concerns that accusations had expanded to include sexual allegations.
“Leaving the story uncorrected allowed further insinuations to attach themselves to it,” he said. “The consequences extended far beyond my workplace. I have become unemployable in academia.”
Humber’s later letter stated:
“In regard to the aspect of your complaint which cites the circulation of an assault allegation, this matter was previously investigated at your request, and the allegation of assault was found to be unsubstantiated, while the ‘spreading’ of information regarding the alleged incident was found to be in the nature of a rumour and of unknown origin.”
Finlayson disputes the description of the source as unknown. He says he can prove it came out of the executive suite. He finds it ironic that the letter's writer may have been the same person who invented the defamatory lies.
He notes that, separately, a formal internal complaint named Vice-Provost and Chief Academic Officer Melanie Spence-Ariemma as the complainant. Signed and dated December 12, 2023, it repeats the previous defamatory allegations attributed to Bagot and portrays Finlayson as a threat to students and faculty.
Spence Ariemma and fellow accuser, Guelph Humber/Sheridan College instructor Wael Ramadan, have refused to retract their statements.
Humber dismissed Finlayson for cause on July 11, 2025, relying on Gita Anand (sister of Canadian Foreign Minister Anita Anand) and Reilly Cunningham of Sherrard Kuzz LLP’s investigative findings that included “reprisal.” The investigator’s report stated: “I find PF filed the complaint against WR as an act of reprisal for the complaint filed against him.”
That complaint concerned fellow instructor Wael Ramadan. Finlayson says his evidence included material posted or shared by Ramadan calling Jews Bolsheviks who murdered four million in the Holodomor and who he considered subhuman.
VP Spence Ariemma.
“I filed a human rights complaint about material posted by Ramadan that said that Jews skinned people alive and made clothing from their skin,” Finlayson said.
“My complaint was itself treated as reprisal, and that finding became part of the grounds for firing me.
Only at Humber College and the University of Guelph could someone be fired for protesting a fellow faculty member engaging in Hitlerian rhetoric.”
Finlayson disputes the investigation’s findings. He says he received no severance from Humber, was not paid properly during his suspension, did not receive benefits and said that Humber College attempted to take back his pension.
Service Canada did not accept the employer’s misconduct position when assessing his Employment Insurance claim.
Finlayson is requesting a correction through institutional channels, with the intention that it reaches affected former and current students, faculty and staff.
He is pursuing a claim against OPSEU at the OLRB. The University of Guelph, Humber College, OPSEU and CUPE have eight lawyers fighting Finlayson and have spent over one million dollars on legal expenses and other related costs.
Finlayson says that after a long period of recovery from injuries documented by WSIB and treated through their benefits program, he is preparing to take four of the key officials involved to the Human Rights Tribunal of Ontario.
“The thuggishness and outright dishonesty of union officials and key administrative officials at Guelph, OPSEU, CUPE and Humber College is shocking,” Finlayson said. “But they have violated the human rights code, and I, in spite of their efforts, have spent almost three years documenting their actions and their words, and they will have to give an accounting in court.”
Finlayson hopes the University of Guelph and Humber College will be forced to publicly own up to what they did.
“They were not happy with firing a excellent and beloved professor because he stood with Israel,” he said. “They had to deliberately destroy his reputation, and then when caught they didn’t just say they would not stop spreading their lies - they threatened me that I could end up in jail for asking staff members to stop lying about me."
The actions of the University of Guelph and Humber College are and have been hateful, indecent and cruel.”
Media contact
Paul Finlayson
pfinlayson30@gmail.com
Relevant correspondence, supporting screenshots and interviews available on request. Any recipient can share, retweet or repost any of the above.
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(I used AI on this for legal vetting)