MUT withdraws strike action after meeting with Education Ministry

The Malta Union of Teachers yesterday withdrew its planned strike action following a meeting with the Education Ministry yesterday morning.

In a statement, the Union said that after a meeting of its general council and a meeting with the Education Ministry it had decided to withdraw the strike action that was planned to affect all schools across the island tomorrow.

The strike had been called after the Union objected to amendments to the Education Act which, it said, would remove teachers’ professional status.

The action was withdrawn, the MUT said, after an agreement that the new clauses related to warrants and licences being tied with training and proficiency be removed. The Union also insisted that it would not accept a situation in which they are accused of misinterpreting such clauses.

The government withdrew the controversial amendments on Friday evening.

A principal agreement for amendments in clauses regarding qualifications, home-schooling, school licences, board structures, information gathering and security had also been reached, the Union said. These were issues that the MUT had raised earlier in the week, according to the statement.

In the light of this agreement, the MUT withdrew its industrial action, suspending the strike action that had been called for tomorrow, but reserved the right to take similar action if changes to the Education Act, or any other Act, were tabled without consultation with the union.

Government: ‘Everybody has won’

In a short statement, the government said that the suspension of the planned strike was a situation in which everyone had won. It said that work related to the amendments discussed between the MUT and the Education Ministry would begin soon and that it was looking forward to turning a new page and continuing to work for the betterment of the education sector and for children, educators and parents across the country.

Tomorrow will be a normal school day, the government said.

Government was too hasty AD

In a statement earlier, Alternattiva Demokratika said that the government had been too hasty in presenting the Education Bills for discussion in Parliament with the changes being proposed. This is a shame, considering that the draft Act had been the subject of a consultation process some months ago. It would have been wiser, it said, had the government engaged all those involved in an effort to obtain wider endorsement and the best out of the process throughout.