Negotiations between Quebec and its teachers are becoming more difficult. Teachers affiliated to the Autonomous Federation of Education (FAE) are seeking the intervention of a mediator and are mulling pressure tactics for the start of the school year if the impasse persists.
The FAE, which represents 60,000 teachers, on Wednesday sent a request for mediation to the labor ministry. Bill 23 “set fire to the powder” last week, says its chair, Melanie Hubert.
“The minister wanted to settle things that were backdoored into employer deposit books and that really affected our members,” he said. It is imperative that we find solutions to the problems and obviously, the way it is working at the moment, we cannot find ways to get close.
FAE believes that the needs of students have become so great that they cannot be met through continuing education alone as provided in Bill 23.
Quebec is also relying heavily on the use of “classroom assistants”, teachers who come in to lend a hand to elementary school teachers, but this additional support will not allow students with difficulty accessing more specialized services, the union federation said. Have to say
Other pressure tactics to come
If mediation does not produce expected results, pressure tactics may trigger this decline, says its president.
“This is one of the options we are considering for the start of the school year, nothing has been ruled out,” she said. “But the aim is really to come to an agreement” to find a solution to the overcrowding of classes and the lack of staff. “It can’t go on like this anymore,” says Ms. Hubert.
The teachers’ collective agreement expired on March 31.
