Regardless of whether they vote for or against the agreement in principle concluded by the FAE with the government, teachers would be disappointed by the content of this proposal, according to teacher Marie-Josée Latour.
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In an interview with LCN, Ms. Latour, who voted at the general assembly of the Alliance of Professors of Montreal, explains that very few teachers seemed enthusiastic about the government's offer.
“This agreement doesn’t excite teachers at all,” she says. During the long periods of questions that existed [lors de l’assemblée générale] There has not been an enthusiastic response to the proposed agreement.”
“In general, teachers are disappointed with this agreement,” she continues. What we've heard is that the people who voted for it because they are convinced that we can't get more from the government, so a little bit out of spite and because they don't think it's a good deal. “
Marie-Josée Latour believes that the provisions on professional autonomy and class composition in the proposed agreement leave something to be desired.
“The problem lies in the composition of the class,” she said. Unfortunately, the reason we decided to launch an indefinite general strike after almost a year of negotiations was to achieve real benefits for our students and unfortunately we will have to wait.
“It is so minimal what we are granted, even considering the sums allocated to improve the composition of the class,” she adds. The mechanisms differ between the FAE and FSE agreements and yet there is no one in either union who is happy with this aspect of the agreement. This is really a missed opportunity for the government.”
The teacher believes the cuts the government made to the education network in the early 2000s have still not been made up for.
“I've been teaching for 18 years and, for example, I've never seen a psychologist in my career,” she says. It’s not because I haven’t dealt with children who had great needs, but I’ve never seen one on the network.”
“We have reached the limit, the end of the line, things have to change,” Ms. Latour continues. So if it doesn't work through our collective agreement, then so be it. We are waiting for the government's action. He has to make things right. We saw that the population stood behind teachers this fall, not because they were happy that we were on strike, but because we really need to make the necessary social decisions. And this is urgent.”
Watch the full interview in the video above