The Government's Side

There are two sides to every story, as Yoda says, so HTP went out to get the 411 from the other horse’s mouth: the Ministry of Education. Your friendly neighborhood cub reporter called up the Ministry on the afternoon of October 21 to get the scoop from Dave Johnson’s press secretary, Rita Smith. Ms. Smith was kind enough to give HTP a few minutes to chew the fat over the impending strike.

Talks with the province ended Tuesday at noon, with Minister Johnson presenting his four-point plan to guarantee the safety of students at school. However, the teachers were still talking at the headquarters of the Ontario Teacher’s Federation well past 6:00. Smith says only the unions know why they chose to walk away from the government’s negotiation table. She pointed out that the government’s door is never closed; if the unions want to resume talks on Bill 160, the Ministry would be more than happy to meet with them. When asked if the government intended to pass back-to-work legislation to force illegally striking teachers back to work, she replied “Why would they obey a new law... when they are already planning to ignore an existing one?”. In response to a question regarding how much money the Tories would cut from education, she said it would be well under $ 1 billion, but said only the Minister of Finance could provide an exact amount. When asked why the Finance Ministry would not commit to reinvesting money saved from cuts to education back into school budgets, she told me only the Finance Minister could say (A recent leaked document puts it at around $670 million).

Here are the facts: the Government is trying to improve education in the Province of Ontario. Their attitude is that school board bureaucracy and teacher’s unions are holding them back, by refusing to compromise and give up power. The unions claim that Bill 160 is a power grab by a dictatorial government, and that the legislation will remove democracy from education by making the cabinet responsible for things such as education tax increases and class size. But how undemocratic is that? Who sets tax increases and class sizes now? The trustees, who are notoriously ineffective desk jockeys who (like Jean Wong-Chong of Mississauga) run for trustee positions they know nothing about, just to get a $5000 per year salary? Faceless board-office or city hall denizens? If the cabinet (which is directly, democratically elected by the people of Ontario) sets these policies, it is directly and obviously responsible to the people for its decisions. The Government will have to live or die by that cabinet decision. The people will remember what the cabinet did, and will not vote them in again (or so the theory goes) if they don’t like what they did to class sizes or tax levels. Who remembers what their trustee’s stance on tax increases was? Making the cabinet responsible for these areas of legislation will make them directly responsible to the electorate for their education policies.

The unions say they are looking out for Ontario’s children. But is that really true? If Bill 160 is approved, 4000 to 1000 teachers will be taken out of the system, probably through a combination of attrition (not filling positions made empty by retiring teachers) and layoffs. The Ontario Teacher’s Federation is willing to can the whole of Bill 160, on the basis of the firings alone. After all, teachers pay union dues, which means that teacher’s unions will lose money if many teachers are laid off or retired. So whose interests do they really represent: the students, who do nothing for them, or the teachers, who pay them dues. The unions are primarily looking out for their members. It’s their job. Bill 160 could be a good piece of legislation, if the Ontario Teacher’s Federation would concentrate on getting the Government to be more specific when spelling out its intentions. For instance, the phrase “limiting class sizes” doesn’t really mean anything. A government that “limits” class sizes can either raise or lower the number of students in a classroom. Similarly, the Conservatives claim Bill 160 will allow them to set education property tax levels. Does that mean that taxes will be raised, lowered or kept at their current levels?

The Ontario Teacher’s Federation is convinced that it is right, and that it has the only valid solutions. Its advertising campaigns make it seem that it is the only sane voice in a wilderness of fascist, undemocratic, power-hungry Government wolves. Lately, unions have decided that they are the only voices of morality, democracy and the public good left in right-wing Ontario, and have gone out to prove their sanctity in the odious “Days of Action” protests. Remember them? The unions marched on downtown Toronto, and showed how democratic and socially aware they were by making asses of themselves, starting a clumsy riot outside of Queens Park, and reducing working women trying to reach their jobs by subway to tears by blocking their path. Don’t get me wrong. I’m not some neo-conservative simpleton who only sees the Government as good, and the unions as bad. I just don’t think that the unions should hold themselves up as models of socially aware, only-looking-out-for-the-common-man sort of organizations. They have hidden agendas, just as the Government does.

In the end, a strike seems unavoidable. The Government has presented a Bill which, on the surface, seems to be an honest effort to improve the quality of education in the Province of Ontario. However, vagueness and uncertainties surround the legislation, and many are confused as to the Tories’ true intentions. Teacher’s unions are taking a far too aggressive approach to the legislation, by refusing to back down on obvious areas the Government will never compromise on, and by acting pious and saying “We are only looking out for the children”. This lets the Government get away with leaving sneaky vagueness in the Bill, hiding its true intentions. In the end, a strike will probably not help schoolkids at all. Ontario students will have to accept that they will be used as pawns to solve other people’s problems.