School must be back in session as the days of discontent for teachers have arrived once again. Alberta teachers have been the latest bunch to strike in what seems to be an unfortunate Canadian tradition. Teachers really love to strike or have “job actions”- such as working to rule or denying students extra-curricular activities – against conservative governments like those of Alberta Premier Danielle Smith. However, teachers’ unions also have no hesitation about striking against governments that have been nothing but agreeable with their ongoing, unreasonable demands. This happened in Ontario under the Dalton McGuinty government, which repeatedly gave the unions virtually everything they wanted and spent massive amounts of taxpayer dollars increasing education spending, yet still faced disruptive union actions.
The Alberta government offer to teachers prior to the current strike included a 12 per cent wage increase over four years and a commitment to hire 3,000 more teachers. Many private sector Canadian workers would be delighted to enjoy a 12 per cent increase in their salary, which exceeds the national average wage increase. Alberta teachers also have salaries above the national average for teachers. The union should have also been delighted by the additional 3,000 teachers, as that would give a serious boost to their union revenues. But alas, a strike still had to occur.
In Ontario, we are currently being inundated by radio ads funded by teachers’ unions whining about class size and how students are suffering terribly because of excessively large classes. There is absolutely no evidence that class size, within reasonable limits that are certainly achieved by our public school system, has any impact on student outcomes. In fact, some studies suggest that larger class sizes can actually be beneficial to students as they have more of a tendency to work together with their fellow students and engage in group problem solving.
Class sizes are very important to unions, however, as every added teacher means more union dues paid. It’s unlikely that teachers’ unions will ever be happy until there is one teacher for every student. And the constant strikes and job actions by teachers in Canada indicate that they really have no interest in the welfare of students but are much more concerned about their own pocketbooks.
There is absolutely no good reason students and parents in Canada should be so frequently disrupted by teacher strikes. One of the sticking points is we parents ourselves, as of course we want to support the teachers that are dealing daily with our children. Teachers’ unions love to appeal to parents with their tales of woe about what terrible things their children will be subjected to if the unions don’t get their way. This is basically extortion. Many good teachers are unhappy about the ultimatums unions deliver to parents and government but are afraid to bring them up because union sanctions on rebellious teachers are so severe. If we really believe these strikes are excessive, parents should stand up supporting teachers, but opposing the intransigent union demands.
As well, we all need to realize that the more private sector workers are required to pay into generous public sector salaries and pensions, the less we have to invest in our own pensions. Public sector pensions in Canada are much more generous than their private sector counterparts, only because we taxpayers can be forced by mandatory taxes to shore up public sector pension underfunding which private sector companies cannot. Public sector unions, including teachers’ unions, often protest with words such as “Don’t touch our pensions.” Yet with every public sector demand, they are touching the pensions of the majority of Canadians who work in the private sector.
Canada’s teachers are some of the best-paid in the world, with very generous pensions and other benefits most Canadians don’t enjoy. They also work about nine months of the year, with a lovely summer vacation factored in. Actuarily, data show that Canadian teachers are one of the groups with the longest life spans in the world. Because of early retirements and gold-plated pensions, many teachers actually collect pensions for longer than they work. Anyone will tell you this is a recipe for financially unsustainable pensions, for which private sector taxpayers are always the ones on the hook to pay for the unfunded liabilities.
There is zero reason Canadians should put up with these teacher strikes. We parents need to stand up in a reasonable manner and ask teachers’ unions to stop using our children as bargaining chips. In future, it should be arranged that all teacher strikes take place in the summer months. That should take care of the problem.
She has published numerous articles in journals, magazines & other media on issues such as free trade, finance, entrepreneurship & women business owners. Ms. Swift is a past President of the Empire Club of Canada, a former Director of the CD Howe Institute, the Canadian Youth Business Foundation, SOS Children’s Villages, past President of the International Small Business Congress and current Director of the Fraser Institute. She was cited in 2003 & 2012 as one of the most powerful women in Canada by the Women’s Executive Network & is a recipient of the Queen’s Silver & Gold Jubilee medals.
