In a serious escalation of the dispute with the ASTI, the Minister for Education, Mr Dempsey, has told the union to withdraw its ban on a new science course, or face investigation for a breach of the national pay deal.
Mr Dempsey has in recent days forcefully reminded the union that it agreed to co-operate with modernisation and curricular changes in return for the 21 per cent it received from the pay deal and benchmarking. He says its ban on the new Junior Cert course represents industrial action.
However, the ASTI executive, which meets this weekend, will contest this view. The union says it has taken the action because of the dilapidated state of many school laboratories.
Mr Dempsey is set to ask the teachers' conciliation council to rule on whether there has been a breach of the new pay deal, Sustaining Progress.
Its ruling will be binding on both sides in the dispute. Teachers will still get any money due from the pay deal provided the union complies with the finding of the council. The ASTI would, however, have to withdraw the ban if the council finds against the union.
ASTI members are incensed that the Government is attempting to press ahead with the new course even though laboratory facilities in many schools are dilapidated.
For his part, Mr Dempsey is known to be furious at the ASTI directive, issued last month, to ban co-operation with the new course.
There is a strong view in Government that a group within the union, having been defeated in their pay battle, are now fighting the battle on another front.
ASTI denies this. It says members are motivated solely by health and safety concerns.
Last May, the Minister for Education, Mr Dempsey, announced a series of grant supports for schools to help modernise facilities. But ASTI say this is totally inadequate. Some laboratories, they argue, do not meet health and safety standards. The union also wants more in-service training for teachers - and the appointment of lab technicians - before the course is introduced.
The ambitious new science course represents a central plank in the Government's efforts to help revive waning student interest in science. Only about one in seven students take higher level physics and chemistry in the Leaving Cert exam. The Government has come under intense pressure from the hi-tech sector to increase student interest in science.
The fall-off has been blamed, in part, on the current Junior Cert syllabus, which is regarded as bookish and old-fashioned. The new course, by contrast, places great emphasis on practical work. Students are asked to complete over 30 experiments.
The Department's grant package promised that labs in poor repair would be given priority in the building programme. About 250 schools, said by the Department to require modest levels of work, can secure €3,500 per year. A grant of about €8,000 is available to a further 400 schools to help upgrade facilities.
The other second-level teaching union, the TUI , is likely to introduce the new course.
