The high price of happy teachers
Perhaps the only positive thing about the prospect of Ontario teachers commencing strike action by May 10 is that we’ll finally be able to calculate the per diem cost of peace with their unions. In February 2013, when Kathleen Wynne took over as premier after Dalton McGuinty resigned, she repealed the controversial Bill 115 — which eliminated sick day banking and froze wages — and reopened negotiations with the Elementary Teachers’ Federation of Ontario (ETFO) and the Ontario Secondary School Teachers’ Federation (OSSTF). The two sides settled on an agreement, for an undisclosed price.
Eventually, thanks to an auditor general’s report released in November 2014, we found out that price: $468 million. Crucially, that agreement was settled ahead of the provincial election, which saw Ontario’s teachers’ unions campaign heavily against the Progressive Conservatives — but not necessarily in favour of any particular party, they insisted — warning that then-PC leader Tim Hudak would ratify “dangerous” education clawbacks if elected. The tactic worked, and in June 2014, the Ontario Liberals under Wynne won their coveted majority government.
But now things are different; the campaign is over and the next election is years away. That cushion has allowed Education Minister Liz Sandals to take a harder line on education financing, suggesting that many schools across the province might be shut down, especially considering that over 600 institutions are operating half-empty. The recent provincial budget also indicated that education spending has stalled, going up a mere two per cent as the province wrangles with a projected $8.5 billion deficit, which it hopes to eliminate in 2017-2018. The plan for education, thus, is one of “net zero,” meaning any gains — in wages or benefits, for example — will have to be offset by cuts in other areas.
Teachers’ unions are not pleased — just as the sun shines brighter in spring and sprinkles taste nice on ice cream. Public high school teachers in Durham went on strike over a week ago, joined by Sudbury teachers on April 27. So far, 26,000 students are out of class and they are likely to be joined by many more as high school and elementary teachers find them- selves in strike positions by May 4 and May 10 respectively. But as the National Post’s Ashley Csanady reported earlier this week, the precise issues causing the strife this time around are still unclear: the unions say it’s not about wages, per se, but about prep time. Teachers don’t want to be tasked with administrative duties when they should be preparing for classroom lessons, they say.
“I can honestly tell you that over the last month and a half we haven’t even thought about salary or monetary issues because we have been working on non-monetary issues,” said Sam Hammond ETFO president.
The problem, of course, is that the way to solve non-monetary issues — large class sizes, better prep time, improved classroom supplies — is with monetary solutions: more teachers, added administrators, greater budgeting for supplies and necessary financials to cover sick days. And despite how the issues are being discussed in the media now, it is almost inevitable that the topic of teachers’ wages will make it to the table at some point.
So despite the lingering unknowns about what, exactly, is happening at the bargaining table, the main question, as
With another provincial election years away, the Wynne government is far less likely to fork over the cash
always, is how much it’ ll all cost. Last time, $468 million bought labour peace for roughly 800 days. That is, approximately, $585,000 per day. Unfortunately for the ETFO and OSSTF, there has been a dramatic depreciation in the value of teacher peace since the 2014 provincial election. With another provincial election years away, the Wynne government will be far less likely to fork over such copious amounts of cash, especially considering ongoing parallel negotiations with the province’s nurses, doctors and other public sector workers.
It’s fair to say that the Liberals owe the province’s teachers’ unions something for the emphatic push that helped them capture the reigns at Queen’s Park. But as with so many of the Liberal government’s debts, Ontario’s teachers’ unions shouldn’t hold their breath for a judicious repayment, if any at all.