AKASH SAMA­ROO

Se­nior Re­porter

akash.sama­roo@cnc3.co.tt

The T&T Uni­fied Teach­ers’ As­so­ci­a­tion (TTUTA) be­lieves the si­lence from the Min­istry of Ed­u­ca­tion on the pay­ment of out­stand­ing back­pay to its mem­bers is a bla­tant form of dis­re­spect to this na­tion’s ed­u­ca­tors.

In a mem­ber­ship ad­vi­so­ry sent to teach­ers and the me­dia, TTUTA pres­i­dent Mar­tin Lum Kin said the union is deeply dis­ap­point­ed, not on­ly with the Ed­u­ca­tion Min­istry but al­so the Di­vi­sion of Ed­u­ca­tion, Re­search and Tech­nol­o­gy in To­ba­go.

“TTUTA finds it re­gret­table that not on­ly was the stip­u­lat­ed time­line not met, but there has been a glar­ing ab­sence of cor­re­spon­dence and com­mu­ni­ca­tion. The in­ef­fec­tive hot­line and email sys­tem ex­ac­er­bat­ed an al­ready volatile so­lu­tion,” the ad­vi­so­ry signed by Lum Kin stat­ed.

“The dis­re­spect and dis­dain met­ed out to the na­tion’s ed­u­ca­tors and the recog­nised ma­jor­i­ty union in this mat­ter is du­ly not­ed.”

On Tues­day, dur­ing an in­ter­view on CNC3’s The Morn­ing Brew pro­gramme, Lum Kin said over 400 teach­ers are still wait­ing on their back­pay.

TTUTA said while it recog­nis­es the enor­mous lo­gis­ti­cal ef­fort that goes in­to these process­es, the fail­ure to meet the agreed-up­on dead­line rais­es se­ri­ous con­cerns about the com­mit­ment to time­ly and trans­par­ent com­mu­ni­ca­tion.

The union said in light of these cir­cum­stances it is call­ing on the Min­istry of Ed­u­ca­tion and Di­vi­sion of Ed­u­ca­tion, Re­search and Tech­nol­o­gy to “pro­vide a com­pre­hen­sive up­date on the sta­tus of the out­stand­ing monies ear­marked for back­pay to ed­u­ca­tors.”

Fur­ther­more, TTUTA wants “a re­vised time­line for the dis­burse­ment of these funds and the funds to the re­tirees.”

The back­pay cov­ers the 2014 to 2017 and 2017 to 2020 pe­ri­ods.

In a re­sponse sent by text, Ed­u­ca­tion Min­is­ter Dr Nyan Gads­by-Dol­ly said, “As in­di­cat­ed, staff did work on the back­pay process dur­ing the hol­i­day sea­son, how­ev­er, it was not pos­si­ble to com­plete by De­cem­ber 31. The back­pay pro­cess­ing con­tin­ues.”

The Min­is­ter was al­so asked if she could com­mit to more trans­par­ent and fre­quent com­mu­ni­ca­tion with the union on the mat­ter, but she did not re­spond.

How­ev­er, back­pay was not the on­ly is­sue TTUTA sought to high­light. Im­me­di­ate­ly af­ter send­ing out the mem­ber­ship ad­vi­so­ry, the union is­sued a me­dia re­lease on the re­open­ing of schools.

TTUTA claimed pri­ma­ry and sec­ondary schools and dis­trict of­fices have not re­ceived fund­ing for the 2023/2024 aca­d­e­m­ic year.

“De­te­ri­o­rat­ing teach­ers’ and stu­dents’ fur­ni­ture con­tin­ue to be an is­sue at the ma­jor­i­ty of schools and the threat to safe­ty is a re­al­i­ty. Schools have not had re­place­ment fur­ni­ture for many years,” the union said.

TTUTA al­so high­light­ed con­di­tions at four schools which it de­scribed as grave­ly con­cern­ing.

In the case of the Palmiste Gov­ern­ment Pri­ma­ry School, the union crit­i­cised “the ad hoc and dis­or­gan­ised man­ner in which the re­lo­ca­tion was im­ple­ment­ed. The prin­ci­pal must si­mul­ta­ne­ous­ly man­age two sep­a­rate com­pounds, kilo­me­tres apart”.

Par­ents of pupils at the school, which was gut­ted by fire on De­cem­ber 7, told Guardian Me­dia on Tues­day that there were not enough desks for their chil­dren at the Long­denville Gov­ern­ment Pri­ma­ry School where they are be­ing tem­porar­i­ly ac­com­mo­dat­ed. Some pupils are al­so ex­pect­ed to be housed at the new $13 mil­lion Ed­in­burgh 500 Com­mu­ni­ty Cen­tre.

On TTUTA’s list of schools re­quir­ing im­me­di­ate at­ten­tion from the Ed­u­ca­tion Min­istry, is the St Therese RC Pri­ma­ry School which is shar­ing a com­pound with the Poole Ro­man Catholic Pri­ma­ry School; the L’Anse Noire Mora­vian Pri­ma­ry School which has in­fra­struc­tur­al and equip­ment chal­lenges; and the St Do­minic’s RC school build­ing is de­te­ri­o­rat­ing.