Teachers vote for stop-work action

Press, 9 May 1979, Page 2

Teachers vote for stop-work action

PA Wellington After an hour and a half of stormy debate, primary school teachers yesterday voted to empower their national executive to call stopwork meetings to advise them of action against the education cuts.

The vote was almost unanimous, more than 200 teachers voting for the resolution and only about three dissensions. It came on the second day of the New Zealand Educational Institute’s annual meeting. The teachers, who fear that the education vote could be cut in this year’s Budget, decided to mount a publicity campaign to ensure that the vote remains at a level necessary to maintain the present quality of education. Their national executive ! will seek support for the campaign from all organisations involved with the welfare of children. A national executive report drew attention to the effects the Government’s staffing policy would have on services to children such

las school publications, school advisers, and psychological services. One of the first speakers yesterday morning, Mr R. S. Wylie, of Papatoetoe, said that the executive had been remiss in not starting a campaign earlier.

“We should be letting the country know that this is not a sinking-lid policy but an ostrich policy,” he said.

Mr L. N. Chilton, of Canterbury, said that stopwork meetings would alienate those persons the institute was seeking to win support from.

“Teachers do not have the armoury or the weapons to affect the economy and I say we do not want them,” he said. “I don’t think the public would support us if we held stop-work meetings on behalf of the children.” But Mr A. J. N. Graham, also of Canterbury, said that the conservative approach that teachers should not hold stop-work meetings was “nonsense.” In Christchurch, the Minister of Education (Mr Wellington) said that provision for the registration and deiscipline of teachers would be included in an Education Amendment Bill to be in-

troduced in Parliament this year.

It will follow a report by the Marshall Committee last year on the registration and discipline of teachers. Mr Wellington told the annual conference of the Association of Heads of Independent Secondary Schools, that the bill would propose an independent registration authority responsible for all teachers, including those in independent schools. Registration would be for life and would enable a person to teach in any area, subject to certain training and qualification requirements relating to specific sectors. The registration authority would also be responsible for suspensions or deregistration and the establishment of a code of ethics. All teachers would be subject to one disciplinary system, whether they were registered or not. The proposed two-tiered system would enable a charge to be heard and determined by the employing authority or for it to be referred to an independent board to be known as the Teachers’ Disciplinary Board.