VANCOUVER – British Columbia teachers will hold a three-day strike starting Monday, but their union president says the job action could be averted if the education minister agrees to jump-start negotiations.
But Education Minister George Abbott seemed unwilling to be rushed, either by the impending strike or by fast-tracking the back-to-work legislation that will take next week before passing.
Susan Lambert announced the planned walkout on Thursday, the morning after the union revealed its 41,000 members had voted 87 per cent in favour of striking.
Schools will remain open, though Lambert said teachers will be off the job from Monday to Wednesday next week.
“We take this step very, very reluctantly,” Lambert told reporters, adding the B.C. Teachers’ Federation gave two days’ notice to the teachers’ employer at 6 a.m., as required by the Labour Relations Board.
“We have a weekend, we have tomorrow,” she said. “If I got a call from the minister of education asking me to sit down with my bargaining team to negotiate a fair and reasonable deal for teachers, I’d be there in a heartbeat.”
The notice comes on the same day the provincial government is to begin debate on back-to-work legislation. It’s aimed at stunting the ongoing limited job action that began in September.
Teachers have been refusing administrative tasks, such as filling out report cards and meeting with administrators.
Abbott said he’s disappointed, but respects the teachers’ decision as the government moves forward with the legislation.
He said there’s no plans to rush Bill 22, the Education Improvement Act, through the legislature and hopes “fulsome debate” will take some of the heat out of the dispute.
“What I’m hearing and seeing in recent days is a high level of emotion, very considerable vitriol,” he told reporters in Victoria.
“I think it’s in the long-term interests of the education system that we have an opportunity, I hope, to see some of those emotions dampen at least a little bit in the days ahead.”
The Labour Relations Board ruled on Tuesday that teachers, whose jobs are deemed an essential service by law, could only walk out legally for three days in the first week and then strike one day a week after that.
Lambert said she knows the move will concern parents, many who will have to make childcare arrangements.
“I understand that this will totally inconvenience them, I know that some parents might have to stay away from work and that will be a hardship,” she said. “I ask those parents to recognize that the public education system in B.C. has been suffering hardships for a decade.”
Lambert said sometimes it is necessary to “stand up to the bully.”
Teachers will not erect picket lines or block access to schools on strike days, in accordance with the parameters set out by the Labour Relations Board, Lambert said.
That means principals, vice-principals and non-union support staff will head to work as usual, Abbott said.
“Children are not obliged to attend school when the teachers are not there, but the doors will be open and will be able to manage within it,” he said.
“They will be safe within that school, but not receiving the normal instruction.”
Teachers are seeking improved benefits and a 15-per-cent wage increase, while B.C.’s Liberal government is holding firm to a demand for a net-zero policy for all public sector employees.
The legislature is slated later Thursday to begin debating the new education bill, which was introduced on Tuesday.
Along with imposing a six-month “cooling off period,” it extends the teachers’ current expired contract and would appoint a mediator to develop a set of non-binding recommendations by the end of the school year.
Abbott has said that if no solution is found by the time school resumes in the fall, the government will impose a contract.
Opposition New Democrat Leader Adrian Dix has previously said his party will vote against the bill and advocate for a return to “real mediation.”
Local news from metronews.ca/vancouver
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