Minister warns any band-aid solutions will lead to much bigger crisis

GL appeals to teachers not to look at issues through politics

By Saman Indrajith

Education Minister Prof G.L. Peiris queried in Parliament yesterday how the teachers would justify their absence from schools affecting 4,063,000 children amidst a grave crisis. 

The Minister raised the question while responding to several issues raised by Opposition Leader Sajith Premadasa on teachers’ salary anomalies and subsequent trade union actions.

 Prof Peiris said that the government had made a policy decision to solve the teachers’ salary anomalies within three months. The solution would be included in the annual budget proposals. It would solve the salary problem of teachers once and for all in a just and fair manner. There was no way to make an arbitrary decision on the matter as demanded by the Opposition Leader, the Minister said.

 Minister Prof Peiris said that the incumbent opposition leader as a former Cabinet minister should be aware that a problem of that magnitude could only be solved in the annual budget proposals without offering band-aid solutions paving the way for further anomalies in salary structures of other public services.

The minister said that the government continued to pay the salaries of teachers and other public servants without any deductions although some private sector companies had cut down the salaries of their workers by around 40 per cent on account of the pandemic. “How can the teachers justify their union action of demanding salary hikes at a time when the economy is reeling from the shock of the pandemic? Who are they trying to avenge by their actions,” the Minister queried.

Minister Prof Peiris said that the government had accepted the fact that there was a salary anomaly issue in the teaching profession as per the findings of reports of the committees that had looked into the matter. Similarly, the government in principle agreed that the teachers should be paid a better salary. But when you view the issue from a macro-perspective it could be seen that there were other public services and their salary structures should not be affected by any solution offered to the salary anomaly issue in the teacher service, the minister said.

The Supreme Court had made a ruling to convert the teaching profession into a closed-service and the government too would be abiding by that decision, the minister said.

Prof. Peiris pointed out that as per the requirements of the time there was a need for continuing the online education and the best place for teachers to conduct online sessions was in the schools with internet and other infrastructure facilities. As per the latest statistics, 84 percent of teachers had been given the first dose of the anti-COVID19 vaccine and the schools would be open only after all teachers and non- academic staff members were vaccinated against the virus, the minister said. 

Minister Peiris said that he, as a minister who had been benefited by the education system of this country, wanted to solve the issue. He said that he obtained his first degree from a local university and had been a teacher for more than 26 year and was well aware of the problems prevailing in the education sector and that it was his wish to solve those problems prevailing there.