It is hard to think of a group of workers that engenders as much public goodwill as school secretaries and caretakers. As the then Tánaiste, Leo Varadkar told the Dáil in 2020: “Often, the school secretary is the first person one meets on the way into a school, and the caretaker is the last person to leave in the evening.”
Various iterations of this viewpoint have been uttered in recent days as school secretaries and caretakers seek to collect on the promise Varadkar made at the time to regularise their employment terms and conditions, and pension rights.
We are now six days into an indefinite strike by school secretaries and caretakers organised by their trade union Fórsa and there seems little appetite on the part of the Government to negotiate. Exploratory talks at the Workplace Relations Commission came to nothing last week on the basis that it saw no basis for negotiations.
Fórsa is looking to have a 2023 deal that put 2,300 secretaries on the Department of Education payroll – and resulted in substantial pay increases for many – extended to include membership of the public service pension scheme, making them in effect public servants. It wants a similar deal for its 500 caretaker members.
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Fórsa claims to have the support of 40 Government representatives, including 29 TDs, one minister, a minister of state, four senators and three MEPs.
What they do not have is the support of the Minister for Public Expenditure, Jack Chambers. His Department – charged with safeguarding the public purse – is opposed to granting public servant status to school secretaries and caretakers. The cost may not be material but the precedent that it would set for other indirect employees of the state might well be.
Chambers does not have a strong hand, and it will not get any stronger as long as the school secretaries and the caretakers have the public on their side. His ability and willingness to hold the line will be tested as the impact of their withdrawal of labour starts to be felt at 2000 schools across the State.
