More than a year after a BC Supreme Court ruling that
provincial legislation violated teachers’ Charter
rights, the BC Teachers’ Federation has had to go back to court seeking a fair
remedy for the impact of the unconstitutional legislation.
In April 2011, Madam Justice Griffin ruled that provisions
of Bills 27 and 28 and other government legislation were unconstitutional and
invalid. The legislation stripped teachers’ collective agreement of class-size
limits and guarantees for services for students with special needs, resulting
in the loss of thousands of teaching positions, including many specialist
teachers who work with our most vulnerable students. The legislation also prohibited
collective bargaining on those issues into the future. Justice Griffin gave the government one year
to remedy the Charter violations.
“Because this government has completely failed to deal
with the repercussions of last year’s ruling, we have to go back to court,”
said BCTF President Susan Lambert. “Given the ruling, we believed that we had
regained the right to bargain class size, class composition, and the provision
of services by specialist teachers, and thereby drive much-needed funding back
into our public school system. But government refused to recognize the decision
and yet another year of cuts has further eroded the quality of services to
students.”
Lambert said the BCTF was particularly troubled by the
fact that, while Bill 22 purports to repeal certain unconstitutional provisions
of the earlier legislation, it immediately reinstates these provisions in
identical terms in the same section of the same law. The BCTF also asserts that
government failed to address the repercussions within the time limit imposed by
the court.
The BCTF is seeking restoration of the provisions that
were unconstitutionally deleted from the teachers’ collective agreement, a
declaration that the provincial government has failed to address the
repercussions of the decision, and damages for losses suffered.
The case will be heard December 3–6, 2012 in BC
Supreme Court. To read the full text of the notice of application, click here: http://www.bctf.ca/uploadedFiles/Public/BargainingContracts/NoticeOfApplicationL021662.pdf