Teachers could lose thousands if they reject ‘final’ deal

The country’s biggest secondary teachers’ union has been warned that members face losing thousands of euro if they reject new proposals aimed at averting school closures.

The Association of Secondary Teachers of Ireland (ASTI) is to hold a special meeting of its 180-member central executive committee on Saturday to consider a deal produced following mediation talks with the Department of Education.

The union’s leadership told a meeting of its 23-person standing committee on Wednesday night that the proposals were a “final offer” and a failure to accept would result in a range of harsh penalties over the coming months.

As well as losing thousands of euro in pay increments which are due to members, standing committee members were told members would not receive a payment worth almost €800 for supervision and substitution duties.

In addition, the union would also be blocked from availing of up to 1,000 middle-management posts of responsibility – worth up to €8,000 – due to be provided across the teaching sector next year.

Redeployment scheme

ASTI teachers who are not permanent would lose protection against redundancy under a redeployment scheme, while they would also lose access to faster permanent contracts.

The leadership also said up to 500 teaching posts – due to created to facilitate the training of teachers for the junior cycle – will not go to schools staffed by ASTI members. “We were basically told that this was the only deal in town and if we reject it things would get a lot worse,” said one member, present at the standing committee meeting.

“If teachers are made redundant due being out of the redeployment scheme, they would only get the statutory minimum in redundancy.”

The union’s standing committee on Wednesday did not offer a recommendation on whether to accept or reject the deal.

However, it is due to meet again and may yet issue a recommendation ahead of the union’s central executive committee meeting on Saturday.

The deal will be put the union’s 17,000 members, unless two-thirds of the central executive committee opt to reject it. This measure is provided for under the union’s rules.

Gains secured

The terms of the proposed deal are broadly similar to gains secured earlier this year by the Teachers’ Union of Ireland and the Irish National Teachers’ Organisation.

Under the deal, new entrant teachers would receive pay increases of up to 22 per cent over the next 18 months, while a new “opt-out” would be available for teachers who do not wish to provide supervision and substitution cover.

Incremental pay increases would be restored, as would payment for supervision and substitution duty.

ASTI members would have to agree to cease its industrial action and work additional “Croke Park” hours in exchange for these gains.

There are also proposals that would allow thousands of junior cycle students in schools staffed by members of the ASTI to avoid penalties in their exams next summer.

This would be in exchange for the ASTI committing to dropping its industrial action and co-operating with junior cycle reform.

A deadline for students to complete an assessment task worth 10 per cent of their English exam would be extended from December of this year to a “second calendar window in the 2016/2017 school year”.