October 2007

KEY POINTS:

A nation-wide list of meetings for primary teacher worksite representatives is being held in the period October 30 - November 14. A schedule of the meetings is attached
The purpose of the meetings is to enable all teacher worksite representatives to report back on the opinions of their teacher colleagues regarding the position reached in the primary teachers' collective agreement bargaining.

ACTION:

Worksite representatives:

Please schedule a meeting at your worksite for all teachers covered by the Primary Teachers’ Collective Agreement prior to the date of the meeting for worksite representatives in your area. You will be sent information for discussion at these meetings closer to the date of them.
Please ensure that you mark down the date of the worksite representatives meeting in your area and that you attend the meeting. If that is not possible for any reason, please delegate a colleague to attend in your place.

ENQUIRIES:

For further enquiries contact your local NZEI Te Riu Roa field staff officer, NZEI regional office, or NZEI national office.

3 October 2007

Dear members

Over Labour Weekend, all teacher worksite representatives in the primary sector will be sent a report on the bargaining position reached in the collective agreement negotiations. Our intention is to have this report in schools on Tuesday 23 October.

One week later, we will commence a nation-wide round of reference group meetings for teacher worksite representatives. It is essential that all schools have a representative at one of these meetings so that all teachers’ voices can be heard.

Prior to attending these meetings, NZEI is asking that teacher worksite representatives convene a meeting in their school to enable all primary teacher members of NZEI to express their views on the bargaining report referred to above.

One further day of negotiations, on October 15, is scheduled before the report is sent to schools. A number of key issues have been resolved at the bargaining table but a few remain under discussion. One in particular, the failure of the Ministry to make a realistic offer around middle and senior leadership reward, is looming as a major obstacle to settlement.

If sufficient progress is made on these outstanding issues, NZEI will be asking for an indication from members as to whether they believe we have a basis for settlement.

If, on the other hand, the issue(s) remain unresolved, NZEI will be seeking from members the actions they would be prepared to take to convince the Ministry to improve its offer.

Either way, your negotiating team is counting on all members participating in this process and providing clear guidance to the team on the “where to from here”. If NZEI is not offered what the negotiating team, and you, believe is a satisfactory offer for settlement we will only be able to make further progress if members get active.

Kia kaha, kia toa, kia manawanui

Neil Hammond and Jane Porter
Advocates

List of meetings

To view the schedule of meetings, click here.

For office use:

NZEI Negotiations PTCA 2007/7
Page 9 of 9
To: All Primary Schools
Files: 325.05