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Teachers..Pay them now...or pay them later

By Ben Meisner

The teacher negotiations in this province can best be desribed as peeling  the first layer from an onion.  As you strip away one layer, you will quickly discover that trying to draw comparisons between what the teachers earn in this province compared to others, requires moe peeling to get to the core of the issue.

Teachers in Alberta do earn more than their BC counterparts.

In Ontario, where further comparisons are being made, teachers will earn more over the life time of their services, its all in the way that they are paid and set in various categories. 

There is a much larger problem looming on the horizon and the Liberal government seems to be trying to avoid that reality. 

Teachers in BC are aging.  In 2003 /04, two thirds of the teachers were over 45, there is a much more frightening statistic however, in 2003/04, 43% of the teachers were over the age of 50. That is where the rubber will hit the road, or in this case, the chalk will hit the board. 

Someone should point the Liberals in the direction of the doctor’s negotiations, they are asking for a further 10% increase in fees and their argument that there are not enough doctors makes the case very compelling. You either pay them what they seek or they set up shop in another province, let’s say Alberta that pays a better return. 

You don’t have to be a graduate of Mrs. Williams’s grade 9 math class to know that if you have a teacher shortage in this province the only way to replenish the ranks is by offering something other provinces can’t, namely money. 

It takes upwards of five years to get that teacher through the education system it would seem to make sense rather than reacting to a problem, you take some steps now to circumvent the problem.

The teachers in this province have received an increase of 10% in salary since 1998; they have been without a contract since June 2004. They received 2.5 % in 2001, 2.5 % in 2002 and 2.5% in 2003-04. You don’t have to break the bank to get them on side.  On the other hand, you do have to offer something other than a threat to send them back to work. T

his whole sordid mess could have been avoided had government taken the position that the negotiating system wasn’t working and they would need to pony up some money to make things work. Rather than trying to negotiate they took the hard line in saying it’s my way or the highway. The result has been that the teachers of this province have picked up the support of not only their members but a goodly portion of those who form the work force.  

That surely should have been paramount in the minds of our legislators when they embarked down this path.

I'm Meisner, and that is one man's opinion.

 

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