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UPE Articles

What is Plan B? 

Government saved approx €1 million

Nearly two years after the education sector agreement expired  and two months after the MUT called a one-day strike, educators are still stuck with their old pay-packet structure and outdated conditions of work. 

“..educators are still stuck with their old pay-packet structure and outdated conditions of work.” 

Striking educators lost on averge close to €100 each, which sum is not inclusive of missed supervision duties which are remunerated separately. The UPE had taken exception to the MUT’s call for strike action as scant information was given on the actual bones of contention in the agreement negotiations. Nearly two months down the line,  the only beneficary of the MUT strike was ironically the government. Effectively, the MUT helped the government to save around a million euros in salaries and transportation cost.  Ironically the saved amount may be rolled out to cosmetically improve the financials of the agreement. In other words, robbing Peter to pay Paul.

“… educators lost on averge close to €100 each, which sum is not inclusive of missed supervision duties”

The UPE cannot but call the MUT’s lack of effective strategy in negotiating a satisfactory sectoral agreement in good time.  With hindsight the UPE reaffirms its claim that the MUT strike was nothing more than a diversive tactic intended to assuage educators’ wrath at its own (the MUT’s) ineptitude. The UPE foretold all this as no trade union worth its salt would call a strike with so much as two-weeks advance notice. 

This gave the government enough time to do its homework and render the strike ineffective. At the end of the day, educators gained nothing from the strike except a hefty deduction from their salary. To-date educators are none the wiser as to what the MUT was actually asking for and what the government was ready to offer. Whilst the MUT expected all educators to follow its call to industrial action it did not feel the need to reciprocate by providing them with adequate information as to what was actually on the table when the strike was called. To-date educators remain stuck with outdated pay structures and conditions of work with no hint of arrears payment in compensation for the two-year delay. 

In this light, the UPE asks educators to ponder upon the following questions:

  • Why has the MUT failed to provide adequate information both before and after the strike as to its proposals and the government’s offer? How can educators tell that strike action was actually effective in improving government’s offer?

  • Has the MUT’s own Executive Council been afforded sight of ALL documentation related to the sectoral agreement including the whole of the actual draft text of the agreement, any appendices and addenda, side-letters, side-agreements and similar documents? 

  • Are the financials the only stumbling block to the sectoral agreement? If so, have the accompanying documents, including the text of the agreement itself been agreed to? 

  • Finally are educators going to be paid FULL ARREARS from the expiry of the agreement to the date of the conclusion of the new one?

Now the question everyone is asking… what is plan B?

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