Ontario High School Teachers Starting Strike Votes

Tuesday, 15 October 2019 at 12:39

The Ontario Secondary School Teachers Federation announced today that members will start conducting strike votes, as talks with the Province have broken down.

ONTARIO - High School Teachers in Ontario will be conducting strike votes over the next month.

The Ontario Secondary School Teachers Federation made the announcement today. They say that after months of inaction by the Ontario government, and no indication that meaningful discussions will take place, the OSSTF feels it has not choice but to begin the process of conducting strike votes. Union President Harvey Bischof says talks have completely broken down.

“The government claims that it wants to resolve these negotiations quickly, but from the beginning they have done nothing to help expedite the process, and now they are simply refusing to discuss substantive issues at the bargaining table. They delayed the start of bargaining by two months and have thrown procedural roadblocks in the way ever since.”

Bischof adds that negotiations should have started much sooner.

“And so it was thanks to their incessant stalling and delay tactics that it took months for bargaining to get underway in the first place, and now that we are finally at the table they are simply refusing to engage in meaningful discussions about the most important issues. Through five days of bargaining they've brought absolutely nothing of substance to the table.”

Bischof also pointed out that the government is sending other contradictory messages.

“Publicly, the Minister of Finance has stated that an agreement already reached in the education sector should be seen as guide for outstanding agreements. But at the bargaining table we are being told that the content of other agreements has no impact on our discussions. Consequently, while the government and the trustee associations drag their feet, students across the province have lost access to mandatory courses, are being crammed into classrooms, sometimes with 40 or more of their peers, and are going without the critical support staff they need to succeed.”

Negotiations will continue while strike votes are taking place. The strike votes will be completed by November 15th if a deal is not reached before then.