THUNDER BAY – A union official representing teachers at four city high schools is hopeful upcoming contract negotiations will be fruitful.
Paul Caccamo, the local 6A president of the Ontario Secondary Schools Teachers Federation, said talks are scheduled locally with the Lakehead District School Board as well as with the Ontario government.
Provincial union officials warned during a membership meeting last month teachers at a number of high schools could walk off the job by the end of April.
“We have a series of dates established to negotiate locally. I know at the provincial level there are a series of dates established to negotiate at the provincial level,” Caccamo said in an interview with CKPR Radio on Monday.
“At this stage we remain fully committed to engage locally in meaningful talks and work towards negotiating a fair contract.”
The union in March had filed notice for conciliation against seven Ontario school boards, including the Lakehead board.
Any local job action would affect teachers at Hammarskjold High School, Superior Collegiate and Vocational Institute, Sir Winston Churchill Collegiate and Vocational Institute and Westgate Collegiate and Vocational Institute.
Teachers have been working without a collective bargaining agreement since the most recent one expired on Aug. 31, 2014.
When asked, Caccamo refused to comment on the specific issues the union is seeking to have addressed.
“It’s been a long time since we’ve been able to negotiate a contract. We have certainly high expectations of how things will go here locally. We remain committed to sitting down with the board and articulating what those items are,” he said.
The last round of negotiations was combative across the province, with the government then led by former Premier Dalton McGuinty introducing Bill 115 which teachers say restricts their ability to strike and cost them banked sick days.
Two years ago local OSSTF members adopted a work-to-rule campaign. They did not participate in extra-curricular activities, such as coaching sports, and refused to do extra supervision.
This is the first round of negotiations under new legislation, which outlines the role of the government, individual school boards and the teachers’ unions and which issues are to be negotiated across the province and which are local specific.
