Education Minister Richard Bruton has hit out at ASTI teachers for rejecting a “substantial” deal in favour of strike action as the pay dispute intensifies.

THE teachers’ strike that closed the majority of the country’s secondary schools yesterday is pretty divisive. That the action was undertaken by less than 10% of the State’s employees suggestions it may be anti-democratic too.

More than 200,000 second-level students and their parents are feeling the first disruption of weeks of school closures as the first of seven teachers’ strikes takes place today.

A late entrant to the profession tells Education Correspondent Niall Murray that over a 25-year career the pay gap between him and colleagues will amount to €200,000