The Australian Education Union should follow its own advice to negotiate in good faith and call off all industrial action while considering the fair and affordable payrise offer the Government has put forward.
The Liberal Government has been negotiating in good faith with all public sector unions, and last week put forward a second formal offer to teachers.
Despite the Government being in active negotiation with teachers, AEU industrial action has forced schools to close on two occasions and school reports going out without teacher comments.
And now we have a Labor candidate, who is also an AEU branch representative, unilaterally dismissing the very good offer from the Government which is currently on the table.
How can Labor claim to want good faith negotiations when their candidate has dismissed the offer currently on the table?
Does Ms Rippon support further disruption to students and families through industrial action? And is her position Labor’s policy, or the AEUs?
Parents around the state will be hoping that Labor’s choice of candidate for Montgomery is not a sign that they intend to plot ongoing disruptions in schools with the AEU to try and score political points.
The Government’s offer to teachers includes:
- A six per cent pay rise over three years.
- Recruitment of an additional 95 specialist teachers in 2019 – over and above the 250 additional teachers and 80 teacher assistants we’ve already commenced recruitment for.
- Reducing contact hours for primary school teachers from 22 to 20 hours per week in line with high schools.
- Introduction of paid well-being time for teachers.
- Making teaching more family friendly by increasing paid parental leave from 14 to 16 weeks and paying superannuation for the first 12 months of unpaid parental leave.
- Simplification of reporting requirements recognising workloads associated with written reports.
- A new package to support principals.
