Teachers vote for job action
BC teachers have voted overwhelmingly in favour of job action, but BC Teachers’ Federation (BCTF) president Jim Iker says there will be no immediate strike.
Iker made the results of the teachers’ vote public Thursday, March 6, saying 26,051 teachers voted “yes” to job action. A total of 29,301 teachers cast their ballots, making approval 89 per cent.
Cathy Fisher, president of Powell River and District Teachers’ Association, said that local results of the vote are not reported.
“The results are not reported by district, just on the provincial level,” said Fisher.
She said the teachers’ union is not considering job action unless it is absolutely necessary.
“It’s not going to affect kids, communication with parents, report cards or extracurricular activities,” she said. “We’re going to keep on teaching and doing what we are doing.”
The vote was conducted to add pressure at the bargaining table, she said.
Without the results from the vote, any kind of job action, including if all teachers wore black T-shirts to school one day, to voice their opinion on the progress of bargaining would be unavailable to them, she added.
BCTF policy requires a second vote before a full withdrawal of service could happen, she added.
“It would be at a point of we’ve done all we can do and we’re not getting anywhere at the bargaining table and we have no options left,” she explained. “But we’re not there yet.”
BCTF submitted a wage increase proposal on Friday, March 7, asking for a three per cent increase each year over the next three years, plus a further boost to cover cost-of-living increases.
Education minister Peter Fassbender discounted the wage proposal saying it fell outside the current mandate for public-sector settlements.
