‘We will topple Government’ over two-tier pay

A war that will bring down the Government was promised by the leader of the country’s 35,000 primary teachers if they are unhappy with the outcome of imminent talks about lower-paid teachers.

Irish National Teachers’ Organisation (INTO) president John Boyle’s threat was issued after more than a dozen of his members who started teaching after 2010 detailed lost mortgage deposits, lost wedding funds and other financial losses incurred because of the two-tier pay system imposed on them.

The 800 delegates at INTO’s annual congress in Killarney unanimously passed the motion that was being simultaneously carried at the two other teacher conferences in Cork and Wexford, prompting Mr Boyle’s clear message to Education Minister Richard Bruton and his colleagues.