Opinion by Murray Mandryk •
The Saskatchewan teachers' contract dispute drew 2,000 teachers to the steps of the legislature back in 1988.© Don Healy
There would seem to be a thin line between a government sincerely wanting to resolve the legitimate grievances of a group like Saskatchewan teachers and doing last-minute things to create the appearance of wanting to resolve issues.
Or perhaps that line was never all that thin.
On Thursday, we learned that teachers will stage a one-day strike Tuesday, unless the government returns to the bargaining table for what the Saskatchewan Teachers’ Federation deems serious negotiations about key issues.
If a strike does happen, it will be the first time Saskatchewan teachers have walked off the job since May 2011 — a three-day strike that (get this) is the only such job action teachers have taken in 50 years.
Contrary to my personal recollection from high school almost that long ago, it evidently takes a lot more to push teachers over the line than one recalls.
As such, one might assume recents conciliation gestures by the Saskatchewan Party government might have teachers toeing the mark a bit longer.
One recent announcement sees the government set aside $ 2.5 million for a teachers’ innovation fund that Education Minister Jeremy Cockrill says demonstrates the government “is listening to teachers” by finding “practical solutions to improve the classroom environment for teachers and students.”
Teachers can apply with support of their administrators for pilot project grants of as much as $75,000.
Prior to that, the government announced another $3.6-million pilot project to deal with violence in the classroom disrupting the ability of teachers to teach.
If this notions seem familiar, it likely should. These are things that teachers have either been working on through the STF’s meagre professional development resources — like its McDowell Fund — or that the government and teachers have been blue-skying about for years.
But they may be familiar to you because they are exactly what teachers have consistently claimed are central to this labour dispute.
These were issues long before the government decided to buy billboard space this summer in its at-taxpayers’-expense campaign that Saskatchewan teachers are the highest paid in Western Canada at $90,000 a year.
All this was prior to the government changing the channel in October with its so-called “parental rights” legislation, in which the bill debate seemed to imply teachers were keeping valuable personal information on children transitioning from parents. This may have been another factor that was less than helpful in these protracted negotiations.
On Thursday, Cockrill, in a prepared statement, expressed his disappointment that the STF “continues to work toward a strike while the Government Trustee Bargaining Committee remains at the bargaining table, ready to talk.”
And the education minister was as quick to note that the the Sask. Party government has provided record education funding “and two brand new pilot projects announced just this week.”
The two announcements this week were by no means a last-minute Hail Mary that could have been proposed months ago, or — worse — a calculated political move the government knew would come too late and would make teachers look like they were insincere in their ongoing demands for the government to seriously negotiate a fix to problems in the classrooms.
These are pilot projects the government just discovered and may bear fruit as early as June 2025.
One might still be inclined to suggest this is all about the money — specifically, the STF thinking it can do better than the seven per cent the government has offered.
And it would no doubt be naive to think money isn’t a more important element than the STF has suggested.
But if you are looking for patterns of consistency, it’s hard to dispute what STF president Samantha Becotte suggested Thursday, that “at every turn, teachers have said that committees are getting us nowhere on these urgent issues, and a new deal must include items to address class size and complexity.”
This has been — and continues to be — the teachers’ line in the sand.
Come Tuesday, it very much appears it will become a picket line.
Mandryk is the political columnist for the Regina Leader-Post and the Saskatoon StarPhoenix.
Teachers can apply with support of their administrators for pilot project grants of as much as $75,000.
Prior to that, the government announced another $3.6-million pilot project to deal with violence in the classroom disrupting the ability of teachers to teach.
If this notions seem familiar, it likely should. These are things that teachers have either been working on through the STF’s meagre professional development resources — like its McDowell Fund — or that the government and teachers have been blue-skying about for years.
But they may be familiar to you because they are exactly what teachers have consistently claimed are central to this labour dispute.
These were issues long before the government decided to buy billboard space this summer in its at-taxpayers’-expense campaign that Saskatchewan teachers are the highest paid in Western Canada at $90,000 a year.
All this was prior to the government changing the channel in October with its so-called “parental rights” legislation, in which the bill debate seemed to imply teachers were keeping valuable personal information on children transitioning from parents. This may have been another factor that was less than helpful in these protracted negotiations.
On Thursday, Cockrill, in a prepared statement, expressed his disappointment that the STF “continues to work toward a strike while the Government Trustee Bargaining Committee remains at the bargaining table, ready to talk.”
And the education minister was as quick to note that the the Sask. Party government has provided record education funding “and two brand new pilot projects announced just this week.”
The two announcements this week were by no means a last-minute Hail Mary that could have been proposed months ago, or — worse — a calculated political move the government knew would come too late and would make teachers look like they were insincere in their ongoing demands for the government to seriously negotiate a fix to problems in the classrooms.
These are pilot projects the government just discovered and may bear fruit as early as June 2025.
One might still be inclined to suggest this is all about the money — specifically, the STF thinking it can do better than the seven per cent the government has offered.
And it would no doubt be naive to think money isn’t a more important element than the STF has suggested.
But if you are looking for patterns of consistency, it’s hard to dispute what STF president Samantha Becotte suggested Thursday, that “at every turn, teachers have said that committees are getting us nowhere on these urgent issues, and a new deal must include items to address class size and complexity.”
This has been — and continues to be — the teachers’ line in the sand.
Come Tuesday, it very much appears it will become a picket line.
Mandryk is the political columnist for the Regina Leader-Post and the Saskatoon StarPhoenix.
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