Government introduced Bill 22 today, the Education Improvement Act, that suspends the teachers’ strike action and sets a “cooling off” period, appoints a mediator to facilitate bargaining, and implements a new $165-million Learning Improvement Fund and other enhancements to K-12 education.
Bill 22 imposes a cooling off period and suspends the teachers’ union strike action while calling on the assistance of a mediator. The legislation does not impose a new contract. Rather, it extends the previous collective agreement to cover the mediation period, with the goal of reaching a negotiated agreement by the beginning of summer. If there is no agreement, then the mediator will issue a report by June 30, 2012 with non-binding recommendations.
The mediator will work to balance the interests of employers and employees and their mandate includes the ability to help find agreement on manner and consequences of class organization and the local-provincial split of bargaining issues. Their mandate also requires that any proposed solutions must not result in net new costs for school districts.
The Education Improvement Act also includes several initiatives that will benefit teachers, including the Learning Improvement Fund to help teachers meet complex needs in their classrooms and the restoration of class size and related matters to the scope of collective bargaining. The legislation streamlines and sets the stage for more effective consultations between teachers and administrators on class organization matters and mandates additional compensation for teachers where class size exceeds 30 students. Collectively, the improvements serve as the government’s response to last year’s B.C. Supreme Court decision on Bills 27 and 28.
Above from Government website
~~~
Teachers shocked by Bill 22, a radical assault on our profession
The legislation introduced this afternoon by Education Minister George Abbott constitutes yet another assault on the profession of teaching and the public education system by this provincial government.
BCTF President Susan Lambert characterized Bill 22, the cynically entitled Education Improvement Act, as “a destructive act of legislative vandalism that will violate collective bargaining rights for teachers and have a profoundly negative impact on learning conditions for students.”
Under the guise of imposing a six-month “cooling-off period,” the bill empowers the minister to appoint a mediator who is constrained by the net-zero mandate and tasked with reaching agreement on a number of concessions tabled by the employer. The bill imposes a two-year wage freeze, which means every teacher will lose about $2,800 in purchasing power.
“This bill forces us into a mock mediation that has a predetermined outcome, and is designed to make teachers complicit in stripping the remaining protections in our own collective agreement,” said Lambert. “It’s absolutely Orwellian.”
The aspect of the legislation that is most damaging for students prohibits teachers from bargaining class size, average class size, staffing levels, ratios or caseloads for another two years. Thus, there are no effective limits on the number of children who can be assigned to any class over Grade 3 or on the diversity and complexity of needs represented within any class.
“Why should these bargaining rights be postponed until after the next election? This means students will have suffered worsening conditions for a full 12 years,” Lambert said.
From BCTF website