Labour law may disrupt teacher plans

THE adoption of law governing the right of part-time workers to secure jobs could disrupt plans to ensure all children are being taught by qualified teachers.

Under the 2003 Protection of Employees (Fixed-Term Work) Act, workers on non-permanent contracts for three years can only be offered one more such contract.

After that, a person may be entitled to a long-term contract or permanency, except if there are objective grounds for not doing so.

The legislation has major consequences for the education sector, where up to one-quarter of the country’s 55,000 school teachers do not have permanent posts.

The Teachers Union of Ireland (TUI), Association of Secondary Teachers Ireland (ASTI) and Irish National Teachers’ Organisation (INTO) have been in discussions on the issue. A key question which has arisen in talks with the Department of Education, school management bodies and the Labour Relations Commission concerns the definition of objective grounds for not giving a long-term contract to a teacher.

There have been strong moves in recent years, particularly at primary level, to ensure all school staff are properly and fully qualified. Primary school boards have been told by the Department of Education they must only employ appropriately qualified teachers from this autumn.

But the new legislation may give unqualified staff who have been working in schools on successive fixed term contracts a right to permanency, depending on the interpretation of the 2003 act.

This has caused uncertainty about whether a person’s lack of qualification can be cited by a school as a ground for not offering a teacher a permanent post.

The INTO’s policy supports the position that everybody working in primary schools should be fully trained, but it has also pledged to fully support all members. This may cause a crux for the union, as some of its members may not be suitably qualified.

The Catholic Primary School Members’ Association (CPSMA) policy since 1975, is that schools are obliged to recruit and employ fully qualified primary teachers.

The situation may also raise difficulties in the case of some instructors on Vocational Education Committee schemes, members of the TUI, who are not fully qualified teachers.