Talks aim to settle ongoing teachers’ dispute over supervision
Members of the ASTI teachers’ union agreed less than a month ago to make themselves available for 37 hours of supervision and substitution per school year in return for a payment of 1,427. But the deal is under threat over how it is to work.
The ASTI insist that if its members are available for 37 hours in the school year for supervision duties but are not called upon in a particular week, they should still be paid for being on stand-by.
PJ Sheehy, president of the 17,000-member union, said yesterday there had been “a re-interpretation” of the scheme and he claimed this would make extra demands on teachers.
However, school managers’ leader George O’Callaghan rejected Mr Sheehy’s view of the problem. He insisted the terms of the scheme remained unchanged and said there had been no new interpretation.
“We are implementing the terms of the scheme as they were outlined from the very beginning. We hope we will be able to reach some sort of resolution of this misunderstanding that has arisen in the implementation of the scheme,” he said.
Until the dispute is resolved between the Department of Education, school managers and the union, temporary supervisory arrangements will continue.
There was only a 55% turnout last month when ASTI members voted by 63% to 37% in favour of the new supervisory scheme. Implementation of the deal will cost the Government 80m next year.
Mr Sheehy said members balloted and passed a deal they considered to be acceptable to them. “Then it came to a question of interpretation of what was expected and we found that what was in the original agreement came to be reinterpreted somewhat.”
When ASTI members voted last month, he said they indicated they were willing to move on this matter. “All members were quite anxious that it be up and running by next term,” said Mr Sheehy.
Until the row over supervision began three years ago, teachers performed supervision and substitution duties on a voluntary basis.
The ASTI leader also rejected suggestions the union’s long-standing claim for a 30% pay rise was off the agenda following last month’s vote when members also agreed to allow new syllabi to be introduced.
In July 2002, the Government’s benchmarking body recommended that teachers get a 13% pay increase, which the ASTI has refused to accept. Mr Sheehy has not ruled out further efforts to merge the teacher unions, following a call by Monaghan’s ASTI branch which the leaders of both the TUI and INTO welcomed last month.
