This is not the first time that Clark has attempted to “shift the balance of control back.” As a university student in 1988 Clark became the internal relations officer at SFU and immediately went to battle with the unionized staff of the student society. She won, claiming to want to “shift the balance of control back.” After becoming student body president in 1989 she was disqualified for not following campaign rules.
In 2001, as Education Minister in the Campbell government, she stripped the teacher’s collective agreement of class size and composition language, a move she was told was not legal; advice she did not listen to. By the time she had become Premier, the first of two court cases based on her actions had been won by the BCTF. The government, under her leadership, was told to rectify the guilty actions within a year. The government ignored the request of the court. The government did not appeal.
A short lived three day strike in 2011 ended up in legislation, Bill 22, which was again challenged in court. BC Supreme Court Justice Griffin found the government guilty of taking away the teacher’s charter rights, bargaining in bad faith and plotting to provoke a strike for political gain. They were ordered to restore 2002 class size and composition levels, bargain in good faith and fined the maximum of $2 million.
The court had found the Clark government guilty a second time. At Clark’s request and taxpayer expense, the government sought and received a Stay in the proceedings. They did not argue the legality of the court decision but that the money that had been taken away from BC’s most vulnerable children was too expensive for BC Taxpayers to return. The appeal will be heard in October.
When BCTF tried to enter into constructive negotiations with BCPSEA, and it looked like it would work, Clark fired the whole Board and replaced it with one executive. Talks with the teachers immediately took a nasty turn and returned to dysfunction.
To further complicate the matter Clark introduced her own ideas without public consultation in the BC Ed Plan and the BC White Paper on Education, the latter demanding teachers accept a 10 year term, reduced security and a plethora of other changes to the system.
Negotiations with the new BCPSEA began, and demands had changed. The ten year deal was talked about but never tabled, new provisions tabled by the government decreased teacher job security, attempted to change the school calendar, and create a two tiered pay system to just name a few. E80 and E81 were introduced to bargaining, clauses that would effectively reverse whatever the courts had decided if it was not in the government’s favour. Bargaining resumed but the government refused to change its position, except to finally table a ten year deal. Clark herself continued to sell the ten year deal in the background.
The BC Skills for Jobs Blueprint was unveiled, providing educational commentators with the first glimpse of plans to not only re-engineer the public education system but predominately privatize it without any public consultation.
It became a made in BC model for public education that closely resembles the problematic No Child Left Behind program introduced by George W. Bush; providing profits for private corporations at the expense of a child’s education. This is a program that the US is currently trying to pull itself out of. It was also the first time plans to shift K-12 public education to predominately focus children on working in the LNG industry was introduced.
BCTF was left with little choice but to go on strike, a move seemingly welcomed by Clark. Closer to the school start date negotiations bogged down on the E80 and E81 clauses, a blackout was placed on negotiation details even as Minister Fassbender under Clark’s direction, continued to bargain in the media.
Just prior to the school start date mediator Vince Ready became available to provide his services. BCTF entered the weekend making significant cuts, BCPSEA changed little except for deleting E81. They retained E80, a clause that would still allow government to erase the decision of the court if it was not in their favor. After two court victories on legislation presented by Premier Clark back in 2002, this clause was unacceptable to the BCTF. Talks with Ready broke down and the strike continues.
A Clark approved program to pay parents $40.00 per day, money that had previously been saved from the strike in June and belonged to the public education system, was angrily received by parents and touted as a poorly thought out scheme.
Fassbender again made the interview circuit, blaming the teachers for all the problems, the site to inform parents about the $40.00 began spewing out anti teacher messages, tweets and Facebook posts by both Clark and Fassbender continued to blame teachers and the BC Education Plan ran anti teacher headers. On Wednesday Clark hosted a media event, falsely blaming teachers for unlimited massages and an extra-day off for secondary teachers, neither which were true. Clark’s bullying tactics had hit a new low.
Clarks tactics have changed little since her SFU days. Her actions still reflect her desire to “shift the balance of control back.” This time the setting is not the student union at SFU but the BC public education system. The consequences of this game to children, parents, teachers and the survival of the public education system are far greater than they were in her actions as a student back in 1988.
Original Article
Source: vancouverobserver.com/
Author: Bruce McCloy
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