Social media blamed for teachers rejecting pay offer

A number of teaching unions have said the rejection of the latest pay offer for teachers may have been influenced by misinformation on social media.

Teachers rejected a 5.5% pay deal on Thursday and are due to begin action short of a strike.

The offer said teachers should "commit to a period free from industrial action" leading to speculation they would be waiving their right to strike in future.

Jacquie White, from the Ulster Teachers' Union (UTU), and Mark McTaggart from the Irish National Teachers' Organisation (INTO) said this was a misinterpretation and the deal did not prevent future strikes.

Mr McTaggart said there had been "misinformation being put out across social media in terms of this deal".

"I would say many members will have seen what was on social media and made a decision based on that," he said.

Ms White said there had been a "perfect storm", in terms of getting information out to members.

"Due to the fact that negotiations were ongoing and intense the initial pay offer went out late on the day on Friday and, therefore, the unions were not in a position to provide that clarification, to respond to members' concerns. We did put out further information on Saturday and followed it up on Monday," she said.

Teaching unions had received the 5.5% offer from the employers, including the Department of Education (DE), on 31 January.

It said schools needed "a prolonged period of stability free from industrial action" and it "should only be taken as a last resort in any dispute".

Union leaders subsequently said it did not mean teachers had to waive their right to strike.

Mr McTaggart told Good Morning Ulster "unions can't be tied to a deal which doesn't allow them to take legal and legitimate industrial action where they need to".

But he added: "That's what was being implied here."

Ms White said: "The initial pay offer went out late in the day on Friday and unions weren't in a position to provide clarification and respond to members' concerns."

Tanya Wakeley, a teacher St Cecilia's College in Londonderry and vice president of the National Education Union in Northern Ireland, said the 5.5% offer was "insulting and derisory".

"We just want the minister to realise the hard work and effort that has gone into teaching over the last x amount of years," she told BBC Radio Foyle's North West Today programme.

That needs to be "appreciated in our pay packet," she said, adding that the profession was "at crisis point" in terms of workload.

"Teachers have been putting sticking plasters on education for too long," she said.

Unions had carried out a short consultation with teachers on the offer, but it did not provide the necessary backing for the deal.

Teaching employers have said they are disappointed and are calling on trade unions to bring forward proposals to resolve the dispute.

The pay offer was expected to have cost the Northern Ireland Executive about £49m.

BBC News NI understands that members of the National Association of Head Teachers (NAHT) were the only union prepared to accept the offer.

Teaching unions had suspended planned action short of strike while negotiations on the pay deal took place, but they will now resume that action from Monday.

The work to rule being implemented, means there may be some impact on meetings where teachers can give parents an update on how their children are getting on in school.

The BBC has seen an email from Sullivan Upper School asking year eight parents to make new appointment times, as they can no longer be held in the evening.

The letter adds: "I do hope that parents will understand that this is outside the school's control.

"I should stress again that this dispute around pay and conditions is not between Sullivan staff and the school but across Northern Ireland."

It is likely other schools will be similarly affected.

Eve Bremner, who chairs the management side of the teachers' negotiating committee, said that that teachers waiving their right to strike was never a clause of the deal.

Speaking on Good Morning Ulster, she said the offer does not "in any way remove or withdraw the legitimate and lawful right to action".

"We didn't do that, we wouldn't do that and we couldn't do that," she added.

Speaking on the workload commitment aspect of the deal, she said that "as a result of that totality of the offer [the workload commitments], all parties around the table at that time felt that that would provide stability in school."