Payments for supervision and substitution duties will be reintroduced for strking teachers if they agree to resume working additional unpaid hours which are in place across the public service, Minister for Education Richard Bruton said.
The Minister said the Association of Secondary Teachers Ireland (ASTI) had decided unilaterally to cease working these additional hours - known as the Croke Park hours - and that this had led to the current row over supervision and substitution payments.
More than 500 second level schools did not open on Thursday as a result of a separate row over lower pay rates for recently-recruited teachers.
However, the dispute over the supervision and substitution payments - withheld from ASTI members for “repudiating” the Lansdowne Road public pay deal when they stopped working the Croke Park hours - could result in the indefinite shutdown of many schools from November 7th.
Speaking to reporters in Dublin on Thursday, Mr Bruton said he was disappointed for students and parents at the disruption to schools as a result of the industrial action by the ASTI.
He said a very substantial deal had been negotiated with other teaching unions, the TUI and INTO, in relation to new entrant pay. He said this would see increases of up to 22 per cent for many by January 2018.
Pay gap
Mr Bruton said the pay gap between recently-recruited teachers and those appointed before 2011 had been closed “by virtually three quarters” as a result of the deal reached with the other unions.
He said the Government had sought the co-operation of the ASTI in relation to contingency measures which could have kept schools open after the union’s members withdrew from supervision and substitution dutires.
However, he said this had not been forthcoming and school authorities did not have the time necessary to recruit external personnel to do this work or to have them vetted by gardaí.
“If the ASTI continue to work the 33 Croke Park hours from which they unilaterally withdrew, we will immediately pay supervision and substitution and get back on track and seek to extend benefits to members of ASTI .”
Asked whether he supported the principle of equal pay for equal work - the issue at the heart of the ASTI’s campaign against lower pay for recently entrants - the Minister said he did “in the abstract” and that everything the Government did was about equality.
Mr Bruton said the Government had strived to keep schools open and would be sitting down again with the ASTI in an attempt to find a resolution.
Reconsider
Tánaiste Frances Fitzgerald called on the teachers to reconsider their industrial action. “I would urge the ASTI to re-engage and to look at the deal that is on the table so that these interruptions to our young people’s lives, so far as schooling is concerned, can be avoided,’’ she said.
Ms Fitzgerald said in the Dáil on Thursday that the Government wanted to do everything to avoid any further disruption in schools.
Fianna Fáil TD Dara Calleary said it was another industrial relations shambles under the Government’s watch. “We have been saying for weeks you should seize the initiative and prevent this strike by teachers,’’ he added.
He said at the beginning of the week the ASTI had asked for an assurance from the Government that teachers would receive an equality of treatment in pay.
“This is a relatively reasonable request, one would imagine, and it would have reassured the ASTI you have an interest in resolving the dispute,’’ Mr Calleary added.
Sinn Féin deputy leader Mary Lou McDonald said there was a need for meaningful dialogue leading to full pay restoration.
She accused the Tánaiste of sounding like “a broken down record’’ on the issue. New recruits to teaching were calling themselves LPTs, lower-paid teachers, she said.
