Picardo gets deadline to accept teachers’ claim - or face action

• Considering that the official side has repeatedly reaffirmed that the Teachers’ Pay Adjustment Claim submitted in June 2018 has not been rejected, members would like to relay to you their deep disappointment in you as Minister for Industrial Relations for the unreasonable delay in producing a meaningful and tangible official proposal.

• In contrast, we would like to praise the hard work of our Minister for Education and the Industrial Relations Officer in trying to reach an amicable and constructive resolution to this very important matter. There is a clear incongruity between the commitment made by the Minister for Education at the Pay Claim meeting held on 15th March where he assured this Executive that a counterproposal would materialise by the 12th April, and your comments in your letter to teachers where you state that there was no counteroffer to be put to NASUWT at all. Members are shocked at how you have distanced yourself from Prof. Cortes’s assurances and undermined the value of his Ministerial authority.

• Teachers are unhappy and disillusioned with this Government at the scrutiny and publicity that their pay adjustment claim is being subjected to considering that to their knowledge no other profession has had their figures dissected by private auditors. Teachers feel that engaging PWC implies that this Government no longer has the capacity to decide on the economic merits of reviewing public sector salaries. Furthermore, it implies that teachers’ salaries are now ‘de facto’ subject to private sector approval. Given that no other profession within the public sector has been placed under the PWC microscope, teachers object to being singled out at an unnecessary cost to the taxpayer. We find it discriminatory.

• Teachers have agreed on a deadline of Thursday 9th May for this Government to accept the Pay Adjustment Claim in full or offer a credible counterproposal for their consideration. Teachers feel that 11 months is an unreasonable length of time to have to wait for their requests to be attended to.

• We would like to make it crystal clear that failure to adhere to the said deadline will culminate in NASUWT initiating the process of collective action. This would be truly unfortunate, but inevitable. Gibraltar NASUWT is now being closely advised by the NASUWT General Secretary on this matter and we have the backing of an over 300,000-strong membership across the UK and British territories.

Teachers sincerely hope that you will engage with their union representatives in a direct, constructive, respectful and substantive manner, in line with the core socialist values which the Government professes to possess, and consider the claim and its merits without the need for PWC and without further delay.

There is no need for relations to deteriorate further and for teachers to feel that their Chief Minister does not believe that teachers’ salaries should be competitive and fair. Teachers feel very strongly that the economic value of a teacher should be related to the social need, to the services rendered, to skill, to training, to social status and to responsibility. Teachers’ salaries must be a reflection of the health of the economy and should not stagnate in comparison to other public sector workers. The global cost of the claim should not be an obstacle to placing an equitable value on the basic pay of qualified teachers in Gibraltar.

We look forward to your reply.

Yours sincerely,

Victor Gonzalez,

President, Gibraltar NASUWT -

The Teachers’ Union

03-05-19 PANORAMAdailyGIBRALTAR