Teachers agree on meetings but school year row stalls payout

TEACHERS have agreed times for meetings with parents but must wait until a row on the standardised school year is resolved before receiving their benchmarking pay increases.

Education Minister Noel Dempsey was expected to sanction pay rises for almost 50,000 teachers after the dispute over meetings ended last night. But a spokesperson for the minister said no payments will be made until compliance with the standardised school year is established.

The Teachers Conciliation Council meets next Tuesday to consider results of a Department of Education survey asking schools if they were open on December 22 and 23.

It is understood that question marks hang over around 120 second level and 50 primary schools, but those that did not hold classes had all teachers on other duties.

Agreement was reached last night between the department and the Irish National Teachers Organisation for parent-teacher meetings between 3.15pm and 5.45pm once a year for each primary class.

The second level’s Association of Secondary Teachers Ireland and Teachers Union of Ireland agreed on Monday night that members will hold three parent-teacher meetings a year between 4.15pm and 6.45pm.

At both levels, parents unable to attend scheduled meetings will be offered a time convenient to them and the teachers concerned.

All sides in the dispute praised the public service arbitration board for helping to resolve the six-week deadlock which brought tensions between unions and Mr Dempsey to a record low.

Teachers were enraged by his refusal to pay the 9.5% benchmarking and social partnership increases due earlier this month until the meetings issue was agreed.

Mr Dempsey welcomed the fact that schools will not have to close for full or half-days for parent-teacher meetings and said the objective of making arrangements more convenient for parents had been achieved.

But the National Congress of Catholic Secondary School Parent Associations (CSPA) said parental needs were not taken into account. They had asked for evening meetings but preferably on a Saturday, saying the maximum a teacher would have to return to school or stay late would be six times a year.