Disbanding The Dysfunctional Teachers Union

[Possum]

First topic message reminder :

Here we go again with this august group of ninnies. Hundreds of thousands fewer students since this group was formed and they still complain about alleged classroom overcrowding. Their math sucks. This group has had to have every contract but one imposed and they are claiming the government has ripped up their negotiated settlement??

The premiere should get on the news and tell them if they strike they have lost their jobs. They make more than they are presently worth and they want more.

They start out with better than two months off in the summer time.
They get every weekend off
They get every statutory holiday off
They get every March break off
They get every Christmas Vacation off
They get about 14 extra PD (paid shopping) days every school year
and they want more.

Time to explain to them we can't afford them at these rates.

[chrisale]

Chris, I don't like people who pretend they are hard done by. The teachers are paid quite well (in all areas of education) and do get paid much better than most and have way better benefits and working conditions. They work less than 1/2 of the time and still find reason to bitch.

I don't like people who would stop paying their taxes that funds public (and private) education for every teacher and child in the province out of spite and ignorance.

[Possum]

Coooooooooooooooooooooll

Now wanna come over for coffee???


I can show you my $100.00 tax bill.

[Possum]

Was today the first step in abolishing the BCTF? It has been nothing but a thorn in the side of government no matter what way the power leaned. Time to get these dingbats back to reality.

[chrisale]

My take on the issue:

http://www.murkyview.com/archives/2012/03/20/teachers-should-obey-the-law-they-should-walk-out/

[Possum]

I guess you are just a little left of Mao Zedong with the diatribe. Not caving in to stupid demands is not underfunding. With all the claims "X number of closed schools" and "X number fewer teachers" nowhere do you see a sign saying "X thousands of fewer students." The 20 kids to a class demand is to keep more teachers employed because the are all kinds of reports and studies that dispute the claims about fewer kids to the class yields a better education. I do admire their tenacity but if they keep screwing around the government should pull a "Air Traffic Controllers" move on them. Arguing that the BCTF is not dysfunctional is moot as everyone in BC knows just how dysfunctional this group is.

[chrisale]

Glad you don't care about the Supreme Court or the Charter of Rights... but then, the Charter was dreamed up by your most hated of people, Pierre Trudeau, so I shouldn't be surprised that that blinds you from rational thought on the subject.

[Possum]

How is the Charter of rights and freedoms violated because I asked about the high numbers of missing students. A day or two ago the AVTimes had an article about further declining enrollment in Port Alberni and BC in total.

I wonder how long before the teachers demand a ten student limit because eventually there overpriced people will have to be laid off?

Way too many loop holes in the existing agreement, time to pull the Regan Route on these buffoons.

[chrisale]

I brought up the Charter because that is the real issue here. If you didn't know that, then you obviously didn't read my article I linked to... nothing else to say.

[Possum]

Chris, Its not about anything but M O N E Y. No more and no less.

[chrisale]

Chris, Its not about anything but M O N E Y. No more and no less.

then, respectfully, you're clueless. The government is continuing its assault on the rights of individuals and unions with Bill 22. Which is confirmed by the Supreme Courts decision.

And since in this case those rights directly affect the teaching of children, they are affecting the children as well. Just as their same assault on nurses contracts has had huge affects on seniors care. Happy travels, the longer your not in a home, the better.

[Possum]

Clueless or not having ones head up BCTF ass? I could give a ratzz about how you generalize this as an assault on all unions. It is all about curbing excess greed.

[chrisale]

You simply have the same attitude as this Government. It is not me 'generalizing' it is the Supreme Court.

[Possum]

You may think so but the supreme court could be overruled by one "not withstanding" and then maybe we could readdress the supreme court ruling and just maybe find out the thought process has changed. 'Too many' bleeding hearts have been removed.

[chrisale]

FYI: This is what this is about.

In the words of the Supreme Court

http://www.murkyview.com/origdocuments/Supreme_Court_Decision_Bill_27_and_28.pdf

Regardless, the Charter protects against unconstitutional actions by the state. Both the government and BCPSEA are state actors and so cannot claim to have the
protection of the Charter.

The Charter-guaranteed freedom to associate protects the
employees from violations by the state, not the state from its own conduct. "

"] Legislation that is enacted without consultation with the employees, which invalidates collective agreement terms and prohibits future collective bargaining on subjects that were previously the subject of collective bargaining, clearly infringes s. 2 (d) of the Charter, as held in Health Services: see paras. 119-122, 128,182. I am persuaded that in enacting ss. 8, 9 and 15 of PEFCA, and s. 5 of the Amendment Act, the government did all these things, and this constituted a violation of the teachers‟ freedom of association guaranteed by s. 2 (d) of the Charter."

The only thing that has changed with Bill 22 is the government has PROMISED they would return collective bargaining rights on those issues in 2013.

I'm sure it was their super-duper-fingers-not-crossed-behind-their-back promise just like the HST, BC Rail and however number of other things they've 'promised'.

You can be mad at people asking for the only thing they are left to ask for, a 3%-6% raise each of the next 3 years... or you can be mad at government for ignoring the Supreme Court and knowingly breaking the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

Your choice. I've made mine.

[Possum]

Why should those already overpaid get raises; just because they want one. Remember these assholes did get a 15% raise contract before last so what makes them so special this time?

Chris you wouldn't vote anything but left even with a gun to your head so what are you threatening the Liberal government with?

[Bob Loblaw]

It is all about curbing excess greed.

So why aren't you on the attack against governments, corporations and wealthy people? Judging by your intense rage, you don't hold teachers in very high regard yet you likely have benefited by their work and dedication.

Teachers are in a tough spot and the government knows it. Imposed settlements, binding arbitration, etc are all weapons used against teachers. The government takes full advantage of no taxpayer appetite for disruptions in the school system and uses this against them.

Teaching is not a profession chosen for the money Possum. Considering the years and money invested to obtain a university degree, I doubt teachers are motivated by anything other than a desire to help people and be part of a noble profession.

I wonder what you majored in at university? What degree did you obtain? What job do you hold that is beyond attack, Possum style?

Or would you have the world believe that you know best what teachers deserve? From what viewpoint do you justify your incredibly vicious attacks on professional educators?

Just wondering.

[Possum]

Actually I do have a degree. I worked in a steel mill. This dispute is all about the money and keeping more teachers working by espousing that low class numbers yield better taught children, when in reality it means diddly squat. Low class numbers mean more teachers are needed and the more money that flows to the BCTF coffers. BTW I got my advanced education in the states and paid for it totally out of my and my families pockets.

The teachers have a penchant for getting more and more university credits just to increase their pay scale and not to better equip them for teaching.

PD days are mostly used for shopping or other fun things, camping, fishing .... I could go on. That teachers don't think the general public knows these things shows just how out of touch with reality these people are.

Now if they want my support, they would demand incompetent teachers get axed. They would demand teachers who bully the students would get axed BTW duct taping a child's mouth shut is bulling. Teachers habitually calling in sick the day after the night before should get axed. There are teachers who tend to shoot off their mouths at various social events and at private parties so we all hear lots from them. Want me to carry on???? Its not like all this shit is well guarded secret.

[The Invisible Man]

I think most people support the teachers. We, as working people, need to support each other.

[chrisale]

I think most people support the teachers. We, as working people, need to support each other.

As *people* with rights, I'd say we need to support each other.

I listened to a great interview on the way home from work tonight with the Chinese dissiden Ai WeiWei. Only just released from prison, with specific conditions not to talk to foreign media. And there he was, talking about human rights abuses in China to the CBC.

That's courage.

He had no kind words for Stephen Harpers lack of concern in human rights as he breathlessly courts China for to strip us of our resources.

You can say the same for Christy Clark, and now Education Minister George Abbott. I'm not sure if it's irony, or something else, that comes to mind as Mr. Abbott runs around China while he states there will be no budging on Bill 22 and the unconstitutional clauses it holds.

[Possum]

I think that you have again placed support where it doesn't exist.

No government is likely to let the teachers have the whip hand ever again

By Vaughn Palmer, Vancouver Sun columnist March
21, 2012 10:01 PM

VICTORIA - While the B.C. Liberal determination to hold the line on costs has been one of the main
obstacles to settlement in the dispute with teachers, the other was the union's drive to return to local bargaining on most issues.

The "net-zero mandate," meaning no net increase in
overall compensation costs over two years, was rightly identified as "a fundamental obstacle," in the recent report of assistant deputy labour minister Trevor Hughes, appointed as a fact-finder in the lengthy dispute.

But his report also identified the "split of issues" between local and provincial bargaining as a no-less-fundamental obstacle to the parties being able to come to terms.

Hughes noted how at the outset of the current round of negotiations, the B.C. Teachers' Federation had "outlined its intention to negotiate only compensation issues - salary, benefits, paid leaves and hours of work - at the
provincial table and all other items locally."

It then filed the issues, more than 1,000 of them,
that it intended to negotiate locally, via face to face talks with some 60 school districts. But the bargaining agency for the school districts took the position that the union would first have to renegotiate a long-standing letter of understanding relegating those issues to the
provincial table.

Result: stalemate.

"No discussion is happening between the parties on over 1,100 proposals," Hughes reported. "The outstanding split of issues is another fundamental obstacle ... to the parties being able to reach a voluntary settlement."

The impasse over local versus provincial bargaining was recognized in passing by the B.C. Liberals in Bill 22, their legislative attempt to end the dispute in the education sector via mediation and a six-month ban on further job
action.

The terms of reference incorporated into the bill would allow a mediator to engage the parties on "matters that may be locally negotiated between the BCTF and a board of education if those matters do not affect any other school district, and would, in the opinion of the mediator, be more effectively negotiated as local matters."

The pretext, as Education Minister George Abbott explained it during debate on the legislation, was that "there continues to be a very lively debate about what should appropriately be provincial and what should appropriately be local."

But as he also noted, the lively debate goes back to the previous New Democratic Party government, which shifted the balance of negotiations with teachers from the local to the provincial level.

The New Democrats made the shift in direction in
contravention of a pledge they made to teachers during the 1991 election campaign to protect local bargaining.

Once in office, they appointed a commission to review wage and benefits bargaining across the public sector and it blew the whistle on the way the teachers' union was leveraging local bargaining to the benefit of its members.

The report highlighted a concern about "powerful local teachers' associations, acting in concert with a more powerful central teachers' federation, whipsawing individual school boards into accepting teachers' bargaining demands because, on a district by district basis, they are not able to resist those demands."

The perceived result was "a significant weighting of the balance of power in favour of unions," driving up wage settlements in the education sector, and creating a spillover effect on other public sector talks.

Armed with those findings, the New Democrats embarked on a legislative two-step, starting with a 1993 bill that consolidated bargaining across the public sector, clearing the way for a bill in the following year that imposed provincial bargaining on most issues in the education sector.

"A major step toward dealing with whipsawing and the like," explained the then minister of finance in tabling the first bill. "School boards routinely have negotiated collective agreements which they don't have the funding for. So the following year, they either dramatically cut
service and blame the provincial government, or they come to the government and ask for more money."

The author of those comments was a fellow named Glen Clark. Next year, his successor as finance minister, Elizabeth Cull, drove home the rationale with the followup bill.

"The very system of local-by-local bargaining has created a whipsawing between school boards and teachers," she told the house. "Under this system, demands achieved in one district are pressed upon employers [school boards] in another district, and in some cases to the point of dispute."

Some 52 of them in seven years, by her reckoning. Her figures also showed that a three-year, 18-per-cent increase in the education budget had been eaten up by a 23-per-cent jump in wage costs over the same period.

The reaction from the BCTF to the legislative move against local bargaining was not long in coming. "A power grab," the then BCTF president Ray Worley called it, and he got that right.

"The bill will improve cost effectiveness for B.C. taxpayers," as the New Democrats explained their
intentions at the time, "and there will be a greater balance between the employer side and the union side."

Having rebalanced that equation in favour of taxpayers, no provincial government, neither this one nor the next, is likely to ever hand the whip hand of whipsawing back to the union.m

Now these BCTF teachers lead by union activists are out there not settling with the Liberals, as they couldn't settle with the NDs and wow, they couldn't settle with the Socreds either. To me that looks like a bunch of self centered egotists who think they are worth more than they really are, are above the people who they work for and are above the government of the province, no matter the political stripe.

I think it is time for these elitists to realize, they already are paid more than most, that they have better benefits than most and that they are not irreplaceable by any stretch of the imagination. I think they really believe the bullshit the BCTF pays for in the media in their advertisement.

[booboo]

Out of all this shit going down..one thing I see for sure is that I would'nt want to see it go back to local by local bargaining.....to easily ta be intimidated to giving in to demands they can`t afford..me thinx there needs to be a wee bit more intelligence involved in negotiating...on both sides that is...
I dunno if we ain`t got da money we ain`t got it.....
How come people can`t figure it out...Countries around the world are bankrupt..yet we gonna keep spending money and going further in da hole....
Catalyst folks are taking a 10% cut to try and stay alive...
Air Canada gonna go down the tube if cuts are not made there..

WTF ..then there`s our local City Council...Budget shortfall ..so lets take it outta da Surplus..What happens when that all gone...`they gonna keep borrowing till their tits ups....
That my rant fer the day.....

[lionking]

Chris lets not get into a who's relatives are better teachers because I know I'd win that argument hands down.

Man I can not believe what comes out of your mouth. So you know you would win that argument hands down, is that because you say so, your so full of yourself. I found out that one of Chris's parents taught our child, at Beaver Creek School and, he was a excellent teachers, that cancels your number one. . All the kids really liked him to, that cancels your number two. The parents all really liked him to, that's one up on you.


The factoid that there are approximately 200,000 fewer students in BC than 15 years ago was brought up more than once with the BCTF so their class size argument is crap.

I don't know about that for sure, so I can't comment on it. I certainly will never believe your word on anything.

They get more per hour actually spent working than other teachers in other provinces as was pointed out to the president of the BCTF quite succinctly not long ago.

No comment don't know.

I have taught young children (9 to 13 year old children) and received awards for the great job I did so that alone puts me one up on you,

Who gave you awards?
Both our boys were in sea cadets and, the instructors were given promotions not awards and, you don't get awards for volunteering, you may get a gift or a card, but no awards. You can't even compare what you say you did, to being a real teacher. . That's two up on you

being I volunteered to do this puts me two up on you. The whole argument that the teachers are doing this for the kids is really rather nauseating and is total bullshit

There you go again, is that because you say so. You can't put all teachers in one category. Teaching is like any profession some teachers are excellent, some are good, and some are fair and,some shouldn't even be teaching!
I worked for 13 years for a husband and wife that were teachers. I take offense to your statement that they weren't doing there job for the kids, how do you know what teachers care and, what teachers don't for kids?
I know for sure the teachers I worked for, were there for the kids, through out the year and at the end of the year every year, they had the kids over to swim and, they even supplied the snacks. These students were in their teens.

so lets not pretend about that any longer, OK? I also tutor (again for free) a young lady who was failing high school, she now is achieving passing grades so what's that tell you about our great and glorious teachers.
Ooooooooh I know, that your a way better teacher. Geesh you really don't believe that, do you.

Its time for them to shit or get off the pot.

Nice talk
[/b]

[Drumonbye]

Chris lets not get into a who's relatives are better teachers because I know I'd win that argument hands down.

Man I can not believe what comes out of your mouth. So you know you would win that argument hands down, is that because you say so, your so full of yourself. I found out that one of Chris's parents taught our child, at Beaver Creek School and, he was a excellent teachers, that cancels your number one. . All the kids really liked him to, that cancels your number two. The parents all really liked him to, that's one up on you.


The factoid that there are approximately 200,000 fewer students in BC than 15 years ago was brought up more than once with the BCTF so their class size argument is crap.

I don't know about that for sure, so I can't comment on it. I certainly will never believe your word on anything.

They get more per hour actually spent working than other teachers in other provinces as was pointed out to the president of the BCTF quite succinctly not long ago.

No comment don't know.

I have taught young children (9 to 13 year old children) and received awards for the great job I did so that alone puts me one up on you,

Who gave you awards?
Both our boys were in sea cadets and, the instructors were given promotions not awards and, you don't get awards for volunteering, you may get a gift or a card, but no awards. You can't even compare what you say you did, to being a real teacher. . That's two up on you

being I volunteered to do this puts me two up on you. The whole argument that the teachers are doing this for the kids is really rather nauseating and is total bullshit

There you go again, is that because you say so. You can't put all teachers in one category. Teaching is like any profession some teachers are excellent, some are good, and some are fair and,some shouldn't even be teaching!
I worked for 13 years for a husband and wife that were teachers. I take offense to your statement that they weren't doing there job for the kids, how do you know what teachers care and, what teachers don't for kids?
I know for sure the teachers I worked for, were there for the kids, through out the year and at the end of the year every year, they had the kids over to swim and, they even supplied the snacks. These students were in their teens.

so lets not pretend about that any longer, OK? I also tutor (again for free) a young lady who was failing high school, she now is achieving passing grades so what's that tell you about our great and glorious teachers.
Ooooooooh I know, that your a way better teacher. Geesh you really don't believe that, do you.

Its time for them to shit or get off the pot.

Nice talk
[/b]

I dunno - 10 maybe 11 years old??

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