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Sep 17, 2018 at 11:41 pm
Beat Klossner asks the School Trustee Candidates
Preparing for bargaining for the next collective agreement between teachers and the employers is currently underway.
Should teachers/ support staff be considered an "essential service" when bargaining time comes around?
William James Turnbull
Educators are a necessary service. If made essential they'd lose the right to strike. Which wouldn't help anyone.
Beat Klossner
No!
An essential service is something of a "Life and Death" matter, like Fire Department, Policing, essential Health Care etc. These need to have basic service levels at all times to protect society. Therefore they are Essential Services.
Teachers/Support staff obviously don't fall under that category.
Essential Service Legislation have often been used to interfere with the basic bargaining rights of employees.
It is not acceptable to use "Essential Service Legislation" to interfere with the Bargaining rights for workers.
Joe Small
No, I do not support teachers and support staff being declared an essential service. Doing so would greatly reduce their bargaining power when negotiating a contract.
Kerri Schill
No. Collective bargaining is a democratic right. In BC it is restricted to police, fire and healthcare so that it prevents immediate danger. While education is a basic human right, collective bargaining does not put children in immediate danger and forces the employer and union to negotiate. Working in healthcare myself, I have have seen first hand how an essential service designation slows down the bargaining process.
Meghan Wade
Education is an essential service to society. It is fundamental to a health society. Having said that, I believe in the realm of collect bargaining with a union, members of the BCTF union and CUPE should not be considered an essential service.
John O'Fee
As a lawyer I can tell you that it is not as easy as just making this sort of declaration. Every Canadian has constitutional rights and governments cannot simply declare something as essential. For example, unions and management have generally been able to work out sensible solutions to establish essential service levels in areas of nursing and fire protection. Education is important but it is not a life and death matter. As such, any declaration of essential service would likely be unconstitutional.