The Minister of Education reaffirmed that the Government will activate the request for minimum services so that the evaluations can be carried out, after the call, by the Union of All Education Professionals (Stop), of a strike for all evaluations and criticized the “intransigence” of the teachers.
The guardianship’s response comes after the national Stop coordinator, André Pestana, announced this Friday a stoppage in the final evaluations of all school years, in addition to a stoppage in all services during the next week. A stoppage was already announced earlier during the national exams.
In statements to RTP, João Costa said that the government has already made several concessions to the union structures, which he accuses of a lack of willingness to negotiate and of not looking after the interests of public school students, who are the most affected. “Students cannot be harmed by some of the intransigent positions that we have seen”said the Minister of Education.
On the possibility that the minimum services are declared illegal (as happened recently), the minister said that the decision of the Lisbon Court of Appeal specified that the minimum services would only be at home “at times of evaluation” and that the Government appealed against that decision “At the limit it would mean that a student could spend an entire year without classes so that he can later be evaluated. It does not make any sense.
Chamber of Appeals considers illegal the minimum services decreed by Stop the Strike
The official also said that the measures with which the Executive has already committed exceed 300 million euros. “The Government has been taking steps, either with the introduction of grades for hired teachers, or with the repositioning that we are going to have of thousands of teachers who are going to be hired, or with the acceleration of their careers,” he said.
The measures do not convince union leaders, André Pestana said this Friday that education professionals feel that “there is a lot of money in this country that continues not to be channeled to what is really important”, that is, to “public services” .
The government, for its part, refuses to commit to further measures, thus prolonging the struggle. Faced with this scenario, João Costa reaffirmed that the guardianship will request that the minimum services be declared to avoid a catastrophe scenario in the evaluations. “We want the students, the families, the teachers themselves, to have the right to finish a serene school year”stressed.
Stop announces strike in the final evaluations of all school courses
Source: Observadora
