These are the clarifications to the original Labour Court recommendations by chairman Mr Finbarr Flood, issued yesterday.
Clarifications to Labour Court Recommendation 16756
As a result of discussions over the last four days at the Labour Court, the following clarifications were given in relation to the above recommendation.
Pay Claim
The Court upheld the ASTI claim that teachers have fallen behind comparable groups in the public and private sectors. The Court found that the Union has a sustainable case for a pay increase and that a process exists for dealing with such claims. The Court recommended that this claim be progressed through the Benchmarking process.
The Departments have confirmed that the Government have accepted the Court's recommendations, including its recommendation on this claim and that they will not dispute this finding at the Bench marking Body.
The Departments acknowledged that issues in relation to past productivity could be addressed in the benchmarking process.
Benchmarking
Benchmarking is about comparing public service jobs and pay rates with jobs and pay rates across the economy. It is not an industrial process involving performance measurement. In the context of PPF the term benchmarking is simply a name for a comparative process, which was agreed between the Government and public service unions. Benchmarking is essentially about ensuring that the public service can compete fairly to recruit, retain and motivate its staff - not setting the norm but not losing out to it either. Therefore, it is about pricing public service jobs by reference to current rates in the private sector.
The Benchmarking Body will examine and compare pay rates and existing roles, duties and responsibilities in the public service and across the economy. This is designed to ensure that it will not look simply at the pay rates applicable to jobs with similar titles but also look at the jobs themselves to ensure that reliable comparisons are made.
The Benchmarking Body will examine the totality of jobs as they currently exist and actually operate in practice. Thus the Benchmarking Body will take into account factors unique to each particular sector including past productivity where relevant.
The Benchmarking Body's terms of reference do not require it to introduce individual performance-related pay or to link pay to productivity.
The Benchmarking Body has been well resourced with a secretariat drawn from both the civil service and the unions. It has a substantial budget that will allow it to undertake independent research. It is envisaged that the secretariat will also include an expert nominated by the teacher unions. This will ensure that there is a full understanding within the secretariat of the particular features of teaching.
There will be written submissions by unions and employers for those groups that it has been jointly agreed should be reviewed in depth. It is understood that the Benchmarking Body has been receiving the substantive submissions from the employers and the unions last week and this week. Provision will be made for the ASTI to make a submission.
The Benchmarking Body will arrange its own research programme and it is envisaged that there will be feedback from this to the parties. There will then be oral hearings attended by both sides probably in the autumn.
Ultimately, the Benchmarking Body will recommend rates of pay for all of the groups covered in the same way as the arbitration boards and the Buckley Review Body. Although employers and unions will have to negotiate the how and when of implementation, they will not be renegotiating the recommendations themselves.
Originally the Benchmarking Body was to report by end-2002 but that target was brought forward to end-June 2002. In addition the parties have agreed that a quarter of any increases recommended by the Bench marking Body will be paid with effect from 1 December 2001. The Departments confirm that this payment will be made immediately on receipt of the Report of the Benchmarking Body which is due in June 2002.
Furthermore, the Departments confirm that negotiations on the balance will begin immediately the Report is available, with a view to agreeing the dates and phasing of the further payments.
Forum
The Court recommended that a review body be established to conduct a comprehensive re view of all the non-pay aspects of education. The Government intends to establish this body by 1 June, 2001. The Court recommends that the body should report within six months of its establishment.
The forum will address the question of support for teachers and teaching. In the course of the discussions the parties agreed that, as an immediate step, as an indication of good intent and in recognition of the contribution which Information Technology can make to the education system an ongoing fund should be set up from which teachers can draw down grants up to a certain amount each year towards the vouched cost of personal computer hardware and/or software.
This computer hardware/software would be appropriate and relevant to their teaching responsibilities. The details of the administration of this fund will have to be agreed between the Departments, management and the teacher unions. The Court recommends that individual teachers should be able to draw up to £350 annually from this fund.
Payment Upfront
The Government's position is that any solution to this dispute must be within the terms of the pay arrangements under the PPF. Accordingly, the Government is not prepared to make any payments in excess of the basic pay terms of the PPF, in respect of any elements, in advance of the conclusion of the Benchmarking exercise.
In their submission to the Court the Departments have emphasised the central importance that the Government attach to PPF and the impossibility of moving outside its terms without undermining it and creating difficulties for all those unions who have accepted it.
The Benchmarking process was designed to provide a coherent way forward in relation to determining public service pay rates which would not give rise to the problems of "leapfrogging" that arose in the past. Accordingly, one of the essential features of the process is that the Benchmarking Body will examine and make recommendations on all of the main groups together, at the same time.
The making of an upfront payment to one group in advance of the completion of that process would be completely inconsistent with this approach. In addition, other public service unions could not be expected to accept that one group should be treated in this way in isolation by receiving an additional payment which is not provided for in the PPF.
Supervision and Substitution
The arrangements for the provision of supervision and substitution have been identified as a significant problem in the course of the dispute and as a substantive issue to be addressed. The practice has been that not all teachers are involved in these duties and that contractual provisions are not identical. The variety of existing arrangements for and approaches to supervision and substitution makes it impossible to address the issue by an across-the-board payment.
The issues are complex and require detailed discussions between the three teacher unions, the school management bodies and the Department of Education and Science if they are to be satisfactorily resolved. The parties propose to commence discussions immediately within the framework of the Teacher's Conciliation and Arbitration Scheme in order to have these matters resolved this Summer.
Effects of Dispute
A major effect of this dispute has been the loss of teaching time by all students in the affected schools. The parties were strongly of the view that measures are needed to ensure that students affected by the dispute are not put at an ongoing disadvantage vis a vis other students.
The Court concurs with this view and strongly recommends that funding be provided for this purpose.
The parties are agreed that all teachers involved in the dispute should ensure that the current year's school programmes are completed for all students. Arrangements for this should be organised at school level by school management subject to the normal consultation processes.
While this would normally result in varying payments across the profession, the Court in this instance recommends that any teacher who is certified by the school as having contributed in full to the completion of the school programme, be paid the sum of 1,750. Appropriate pro rata payments should be made to part-time teachers.
The Labour Court recommendation together with these clarifications represent the Court's final attempt to resolve the current dispute. As has been made clear by the Government representatives in the course of the hearing the Government considers that these current discussions provide the final opportunity for the parties to reach agreement on these issues. It is, therefore, clear that no other form of intervention in this dispute is contemplated. Thus, the proposals contained in the recommendation, as now clarified, are the final proposals and should be seen as such by the parties.
In these circumstances the Court believes that it is essential that the recommendation as clarified be put to ballot and that all industrial action be deferred pending the outcome of such a ballot.
Finbarr Flood Chairman 28th March 2001