Picture: MOLLY TAYLOR
AROUND half of the Limestone Coast’s 39 government-backed education facilities will either close or run limited programs on Monday as teachers prepare to strike amid stalled negotiations over pay and work conditions.
Hundreds of South East families are expected to be impacted by the full-day stop work action, which was launched by the Australian Education Union following a continued pay deal stalemate with the State Government.
The state education department yesterday confirmed up to half of the region’s schools would be impacted, with a full list of closures expected to be released by the department today.
A department spokeperson said the government was working with principals and directors to minimise disruption, with every effort being made to keep schools and preschools open where possible.
It follows a meeting between the union’s SA executive last week to canvass the 2.35pc per annum up to May 2022 offer by Treasurer Rob Lucas, with the union declaring it did not support the agreement in its current form.
Union regional delegate Matthew Cherry said the stalemate was more than just about money.
“For our branch, the alarming issues were relating to processing decision-making and regional facility funding agreements,” he said.
“Obviously each issue will impact each facility differently but for our branch we were concerned about the offer’s relation to who is involved in the democratic decisions being made.
“Right now, the decision-making process involves different people’s voices being heard, especially the union and this offer declared the removal of that process.”
Mr Cherry said the current process ensures educators comply with labour law and work inside legal requirements.
The educator said the branch was also concerned about the proposed funding streams to regional centres.
“The union thought we had a guaranteed agreement but the offer did not confirm any of it,” Mr Cherry said.
“The government said it is committed to it, but it is not willing to write it in an actual document.
“For sites like ours, we live and die by our funding.”
The union member said funding was also necessary to retain quality teaching staff.
“If there is no guarantee we can retain our programs then there is no guarantee we can retain our staff either,” he said.
“It creates issues, especially as we are a regional area where we want to keep our teachers.
“We want students to form relationships with our teachers which will inevitably lead into children having the best outcome.”
The proposed Year 7 transition agreement is also a source of concern for teachers, according to Mr Cherry.
“It could have an impact on high school and primary school jobs and right now we are not sure what will happen with Year 7 teachers,” he said.
“Is the government willing to fund extra training for those teachers to be able to teach high school students, or will schools be understaffed and overstaffed?”
“This comes down to who is involved in the decision-making.”
Mr Cherry urged the community to understand the situation, adding teachers cared about students and were striving to make sure children get the best outcome.
Earlier this week, Treasurer Lucas said the government’s formal enterprise agreement offer to the AEU and the Public Service Association of SA on behalf of the state’s 28,000 teachers, principals and support staff was “exceptionally fair and reasonable”.
“This is clearly more than reasonable given the current inflation rate is only 1.3pc,” Mr Lucas said.
Union members are planning to meet at the Mount Gambier Railway Lands on Monday in a formal protest from 11am, marching through the city centre to the education department office on Commercial Street East.
