A time to return to the table?

Ultimately the tribunal’s decision surely wasn’t a great surprise to most islanders.

Now faced with RPI-linked deals, rather than the RPI-plus deals they were seeking, teachers will have to lick their wounds. Some might walk away from education, possibly from their lifelong calling, and may do so with a heavy heart.

Plenty of issues for the teaching profession were raised at the tribunal that they say are driving colleagues away – not least claims of living in relative poverty.

One of the teachers’ complaints is that Policy & Resources’ ‘one size fits all’ pay offer involved little in the way of negotiation on the broader issues which are frustrating their profession. Although finding for the States, the tribunal said it was sympathetic to the teachers’ concerns on this.

A promise to work with unions to achieve a new pay framework agreement was in tension with a collective deal across the States, it said, and the overall strategy ‘undermined collective negotiations for teachers and lecturers’.

Maybe now, with 18 months in hand before pay needs to go back on the table, teachers’ unions and P&R can restart talks about the many issues concerning the teaching profession, with the immediate pay pressure removed.