Kootenay Lake teachers begin three-day job action Monday, Superintendent urges parents to keep children at home
By Bruce Fuhr
School District No. 8 Kootenay Lake teachers will join co-workers across the province in three-day walkout beginning Monday after an overwhelming majority voted in favour of escalating job action.
“We had a huge turnout on Tuesday at our general meeting and a huge turnout in voting by Nelson teachers and they responded very strongly,” said Nelson and District Teachers Association president Tom Newell.
The B.C. Teachers Federation announced the vote was 87 percent in favour of job action — with 27,946 of the 32,209 ballots cast supporting the strike.
Newell said the overwhelming support is primarily due to Bill 22, the Education Improvement Act, the Liberal government’s introduction of back-to-work legislation.
“The Bill in its current form is what we’re dramatically opposed to,” Newell explained.
“It imbeds under-funding and allows the government to continue to under-fund class size in our province.”
Newell also if the Bill passes the mediator would be under strict guidelines on how the dispute between the BCTF and B.C. Public School Employers’ Association can be settled.
The three-day walkout is, however, different in that teachers cannot set up picket lines.
Newell said the teachers would not set up picket lines, instead there would be “demonstration lines” allowing students and support workers to attend school and work.
“We’re going to be set up at all the schools in the district providing information to anyone who needs information under the guidelines of the LRB (Labour Relations Board),” said Newell, adding the demonstration lines will be errected for Monday and Tuesday.
However, the traffic flow will be drastically reduced now that the Kootenay Lake Superintendent of Schools/CEO Jeff Jones issued a Thursday letter asking parents not to send children to school next week.
“Without our teachers we cannot provide a safe environment for all students if they are to come to us,” Jones told The Nelson Daily.
“Having said that we are not going to leave kids outside if they attend,” Jones added. “What we will do is contact parents and help make alternate child care arrangements.”
In a letter (http://www.sd8.bc.ca/) to parents, Jones said there would be no busses running during the three days of job action.
Because there is no picket line, support staff, including janitors, represented by the Canadian Union of Public Employees will show up for work as scheduled, but will not supervise children if it’s not part of their usual duties.
The three-day walkout is the latest in what has been a very long, drawn out fight between the BCTF and BCPSEA that has seen the 41,000 teachers engaged in limited job action since September 2011.
The BCTF has been without a contract since June 2011.
The initial phase had teachers not perform administrative work, including submitting student’s progress using report cards.
It’s unclear what will happen after the three-day job action by the BCTF.
The government introduced Bill 22 in the legislature Tuesday.
The NDP has said it will do what it can to delay the passing of the bill, which if approved any continuing job action would be illegal.
Fines would be imposed for each day of strike action — at least $1.3 million for the union and $2,500 for its officials, and up to $475 for individual teachers.
Check out the BCTF press release https://thenelsondaily.com/news/bctf-teachers-strike-no-school-next-monday-tuesday-wednesday-17392
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