INTO members to ballot on public service pay deal

A BALLOT of 32,000 primary teachers on the public service pay deal will go ahead despite efforts to delay it until their union leaders could clarify the possible implications for members’ terms and conditions.

A motion debated behind closed doors at the Irish National Teachers’ Organisation (INTO) congress sought that a ballot could only take place after full details of a proposed review of teachers’ contracts were made known. However, that aspect of a wider motion on the deal was rejected by 306 votes to 248, freeing the INTO executive to issue the ballot in the next month or so, with a recommendation that it be accepted.

Delegates at the congress in Galway decided by just four votes on Tuesday not to send a separate recommendation to members that they reject the deal.