Late Thursday afternoon, Ontario Education Minister Stephen Lecce confirmed a tentative agreement has been reached with the Ontario English Catholic Teachers Association (OECTA) — one of four teachers unions involved in ongoing contract negotiations resulting in months of job action and turmoil in Ontario classrooms.
Details of the deal, which still need to be ratified by the association’s 45,000 members, remain confidential.
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Lecce described the agreement as “good for students, good for educators and workers, and good for the people of this province.”
The deal was the result of five-days of marathon talks after OECTA agreed to return to the bargaining table.
OECTA President Liz Stuart said the tentative deal means a suspension of all job action by their members.
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“Should the OECTA provincial executive and local unit presidents recommend approval, Catholic teachers will participate in a province-wide vote on April 7 and 8,” she said in a statement issued Thursday.
Lecce said he hopes Thursday’s tentative deal will build momentum as talks continue with other teachers’ unions.
“What’s important is that students remain in class and have a good deal …. that improves their lives and gives them every skill and opportunity to succeed,” he said.
Talks meanwhile continued with Elementary Teachers’ Federation of Ontario (ETFO.)
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The Ontario Secondary School Teachers Federation (OSSTF) and Association des enseignantes et des enseignants franco-ontariens (AEFO) have so far refused to return to the bargaining table, despite the province making concessions on two key issues earlier this week — classroom size and mandatory online courses.
The province, however, is standing firm on wages — only agreeing to a 1% annual increase in both pay and benefits.
Unions want a 2% boost in wages and a 6% increase in benefits, as well as concessions concerning merit-based hiring.
Earlier on Thursday, the ETFO said they’d suspend service withdrawals and rotating strikes scheduled to begin March 23 — described in a tweet as a measure to “limit the spread” of coronavirus in the province.
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