A warning from the Minister for Education that teachers would lose benchmarking pay awards if schools broke up early for Christmas has been criticised by teaching unions as unwarranted and unfair to teachers.
The Irish National Teachers' Organisation (INTO), the Teachers' Union of Ireland (TUI) and the Association of Secondary Teachers of Ireland (ASTI) said yesterday that the opening and closing of schools was decided by the management boards, so the issue was not with teaching staff.
Mr Dempsey said on RTÉ radio that teachers in schools which broke for holidays before next Tuesday would lose their benchmarking pay awards. He said closing schools before that date was a breach of the sustaining progress agreement.
He also said there would be some inspections after Christmas verifying whether schools did stay open to that date.
Speaking to The Irish Times yesterday, the Minister said the agreement specifying that schools should close on December 23rd was also made with management bodies.
"Just in case people think I wanted to spoil the kids' Christmas, my opening position about Christmas was that the schools should break on Friday (December 19th) and it was the unions who wanted to work until Tuesday as they wanted two weeks at Easter," he said.
However, the teachers unions yesterday took issue with the Minister's remarks. The INTO general secretary, Mr John Carr said: "Analysis of this issue clearly shows that involving teachers in this matter is unfair and unwarranted. Primary schools are run by patron bodies and Boards of Management who make decisions at local level. If a particular school board or patron body makes a decision to modify Christmas holidays then any issue that there might be is with the school board or patron body, not the teaching staff."
Mr Carr said already Muslim schools worked a different school year to take account of Islamic festivals. There was no issue made about this by the Department of Education and Science.
"Threats not to pay benchmarking over this issue in this instance are therefore inflammatory and unwarranted. The very least the Department of Education and Science should do is clarify the matter for teachers at once," he said.
Teachers had more than delivered on a modernisation programme in primary schools and had earned their benchmarking money. Threatening and bullying talk from the Department of Education and Science was unnecessary. "Any attempt to penalise teachers over an issue like this will be strongly resisted by the INTO," he said.
Mr Carr, commenting on inspections, said: "This is a cheap shot that does nothing to enhance the standing of the inspectorate as educational advisors and is an unnecessary waste of resources. School principals are asked in several different ways to verify the details of the school year and they do so."
President of the TUI, Mr Derek Dunne, said his reaction was that the Minister seemed to be blaming teachers for the opening and closing of schools. "We had an agreement to standardise the school year and it is very clear."
Regarding suggestions of inspections, Mr Dunne said: "Responsibility for the opening and closing of schools lies with the school management bodies, not with teachers. We have received numerous calls this morning from irate teachers who feel that their reputations are being held up to public inspection in an unfair manner. If any other sector of the public service was subject to such scrutiny, there would understandably be an outcry."
An ASTI spokeswoman said she thought the Minister's remarks were very misleading. "I don't know of any school breaking up before Tuesday in the second-level sector. That was the date agreed in the Sustaining Progress agreement. The notion that inspectors should investigate individual teachers is heavy-handed," she said.