Linda Clode teaches her history class at University Hill School in Vancouver on Monday Oct. 24, 2005.Glenn Baglo/The Canadian Press
The simmering dispute between the province's 41,000 public school teachers and B.C. school trustees may be about to boil over.
The trustees' bargaining arm intends to ask the B.C. Labour Relations Board on Wednesday for the right to recoup as much as 20 per cent in pay and benefits from the teachers' union, whose members have curtailed a number of their regular activities in an attempt to press school boards to meet their demands on pay and working conditions without walking off the job.
The association will argue that teachers should not expect 100 per cent of their pay if they are not performing 100 per cent of their duties.
Since school resumed in September, members of the B.C. Teachers Federation have refused to carry out administrative responsibilities such as filling out forms and report cards, and supervising recess.
The BCPSEA will also be asking for a declaration that preparing and handing out report cards is an essential service that the LRB should order teachers to do. Most report cards are due in December.
"BCPSEA's position is that the preparation and distribution of complete report cards is now essential to prevent immediate and serious disruption to the provision of educational programs and/or immediate and serious danger to the welfare of students," the organization said in an e-mailed statement.
"Parents, students, teachers and administrators all need to know if a student is progressing satisfactorily before it becomes too late to address concerns."
Association chair Melanie Joy said: "This is a way to address the power equilibrium that needs to happen in a strike. The pressure is all on the employer, not the employee right now."
Contacted late on Tuesday, BCTF president Susan Lambert said she hadn't heard of the employer's plan to approach the labour board.
She said the BCPSEA could do what it wants, but added that teachers are already doing their work – teaching children.
The only thing that will have an impact on these negotiations is for BCPSEA to get a different mandate that "respects the rights of teachers to bargain and would adequately fund the school system," Ms. Lambert said.
"I think it would be much better if the school trustees for the province spent more time working for public education."
An employer's discussion document leaked to the BCTF earlier this month referred to a hard-line strategy towards the teachers that could include pay cuts, slashing benefits and locking them out.
At the time, Ms. Joy said the measures contemplated were not intended to inflame teachers. "These are things that employers have, these sorts of options, when your employees are on strike."
Although teachers have remained in the classroom, any concerted reduction of normal duties by union employees can technically be ruled a strike, under the B.C. Labour Code.
The two sides remain far apart in the increasingly rancorous dispute, with BCTF negotiators demanding a pay raise, despite a government fiat that all public sector employees must accept new contracts with no wage increase for two years.
They are also divided on working conditions such as class size, and what issues should be bargained locally or provincially.
Editor's note: The B.C. Public School Employers' Association is seeking permission to recoup from the teachers union between 5 per cent and 20 per cent of the pay and benefits paid to teachers, who are engaged in a work-to-rule campaign. Incorrect information appeared in an earlier edition of this story. This version has been corrected.