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New deal improves working conditions for Nunavik teachers

Pact aims to protect "physical and psychological integrity" of employees

JANE GEORGE

Nunavik teachers approved their new collective agreement this week, with seven of every 10 union members voting in favour of it.

This deal was reached between the union and the Kativik School Board on Apr. 4, after months of intense bargaining sessions.

The Northern Quebec Teachers Association, l'Association de l'enseignement du Nouveau-Quebec, the union representing teachers in Nunavik, had recommended union members approve the agreement-in-principle.

With ratification of the deal, a new central occupational health and safety committee, with representatives from the union and school board, will start meeting three times a year in different Nunavik communities. The goal of this committee is to prevent work-related accidents or injuries and to protect the "physical and psychological integrity" of employees.

Beleaguered teachers in Nunavik have been calling for action to prevent and deal with violence in the region's schools, which, based on comments to Nunatsiaq News, continues to take a toll on staff and students.

The new collective agreement won't change union members' wage and working conditions, which were legislated by Quebec's public service employment act. Last December, Charest's government passed Bill 142, which legislated a seven-year contract on 500,000 hospital workers, teachers, civil servants, school support staff and other provincial public-sector workers. This law is supposed to apply everywhere in Quebec.

The union wanted to see a special retention bonus for teachers who stay in the North, but was not successful.

However, the union did manage to find more money, which will go for special needs resources.

A union bulletin, called Nego News, says the AIP contains some welcome improvements, which include:

• Up to one-year unpaid leave after five years of service;
• Addition of divorce or separation as reasons to request a leave of absence;
• Possibility of using two days from sick leave days to cover travel for medical purposes;
• mor disability benefits;
• Possibility of transferring trips out to certain family members;
• an extra $790,000 for special needs resources in schools;
• $92,000 to assist teachers with multi-level groups;
• Improved conditions for substitute teachers;
• A new committee on occupational health and safety.

The union says the concessions made to the KSB include:

• An obligation to report absences;
• An obligation for teachers to give up their lodgings to their replacements when they and their dependents leave for more than 30 working days, unless for medical reasons, "if the board can show that no other dwellings are available;"
• No payment for billets unless the houseguests are teachers or "those involved in community-organized events;"
• Fewer weeks of parental leave.

If members had rejected the AIP, the only changes to their working conditions would have come through the application of Quebec's more general legislation.

"We'll keep on raising our outstanding issues with the school board, which include the lengthening of the school year and teacher retention," said union president Patrick d'Astous.

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