The Government has been accused of attempting to isolate members of the Association of Secondary Teachers Ireland (ASTI) and paint it as a “dodgy organisation”.

People Before Profit TD Bríd Smith also claimed it would be the Government’s fault if schools close from next Monday.

“The Minister for Education is refusing to pay members of the ASTI for supervisory duties,” and if the schools close “the Taoiseach, Government and Ministers are responsible, not members of the ASTI”, she said.

But Taoiseach Enda Kenny said “at the heart of the dispute is less than an hour per week, agreed in previous public pay deals, to allow schools to host planning meetings and parent-teacher meetings outside school hours”.

Mr Kenny said supervision and substitution were part of the public pay agreement with teachers but the ASTI for its own reasons decided to withdraw from that deal. “The agreement was to work 33 hours extra a year, or one hour a week.”

Mr Kenny said most public servants agreed to work 100 extra hours a year as against 33 in the education sector.

But Ms Smith said “the ASTI is not planning action. Its members are just not working for something for which they are not getting paid.”

She said it was ironic that the State was willing to pay parents and others €36 a week as opposed to €15 a week, to carry out supervisory duty.

The Taoiseach said, however, that Ms Smith “has deliberately missed the point. The ASTI’s decision to withdraw from supervision and substitution is the cause of a situation in which boards of management are unable to keep schools open due to health and safety reasons” and it would affected more than 250,000 students and parents.

Responsibility

Closure of schools was not directed or caused by Minister for Education Richard Bruton, said Mr Kenny. "The boards of management are responsible for opening schools and they cannot open them if there is not proper supervision for the children who attend."

The Taoiseach said “the ASTI could deal with the issue today”.

Ms Smith also hit out at the Government’s response to the call for pay equality for new teachers. She said it would cost €70 million in total, “less than 1 per cent of the education budget to restore full pay parity for all teachers”.

She criticised Mr Bruton over his reluctance to state his belief in pay equality. Ms Smith asked could he could “extract from the Minister’s mouth that he too believes” in equality.

She said equality of pay for new teachers “must be restored not gradually but fully”.

Mr Kenny said “equality is at the very centre of the work the Government tries to do across a range of spheres. I am disappointed that the ASTI has taken a day’s action and that others will follow.”

He said starting figures would increase by 15 per cent between August of this year and January 1st 2018 from €31,000 to €35,600.

Moreover, people recruited in September 2015 would see a 22 per cent increase in pay from 31st August this year to January 1st, 2018, from €31,000 to €37,700, said Mr Kenny.