Teachers set aside the requirement for reference groups
State mediator Ástráður Haraldsson says that teachers have agreed to test a new methodology in the wage dispute. mbl.is/Kristinn Magnússon
Teachers have agreed to set aside their demands to find benchmarks in the private market to match their pay and are willing to try working with new methodologies.
That is one of the main reasons why it was possible to call a formal negotiation meeting in the wage dispute between teachers and the state and local authorities at the state mediator tomorrow, seventeen days after the last negotiation meeting.
This is what state mediator Ástráður Haraldsson says in an interview with mbl.is.
"The most difficult part of the dispute has dealt with the teachers' demand for salary equalization between markets, and for many years people have been in great arguments about what to aim for and how to approach it," he says. On that teacher's demand, all the real work in the wage negotiations ended.
Exhausted the ways to find reference groups
The chairman of the Icelandic Teachers' Union has said that the teachers' demands are primarily about the implementation of the agreement from 2016. That the basic salary of experts in the education sector and other experts in the public market be set equal to salaries in the private market. This includes, among other things, the need to find reference groups.
"It is a dispute which I cannot see will ever be brought to a conclusion on the grounds which have been advanced." Therefore, we are trying to create a new method to approach this topic. That's kind of the core of what I'm hoping to be able to get us to a place for real negotiations," Haraldsson says.
It is at least an attempt that both the negotiation committees of teachers and the state and local governments are willing to make.
"It's just that the finding reference groups have not led anywhere," he reiterates.
It has delayed the work
So teachers have then given in and decided to deviate from it?
"Per se, no one has given in yet, but at least it has been agreed to try a different methodology to see if we can find a common ground about how to look at this, and that's an experiment that starts tomorrow."
The chairmen of the negotiation committees met with the government mediator last week and over the weekend, and those conversations led to the conclusion that there was a basis for calling a formal negotiation meeting. Nevertheless, the talks are at a very early stage.
"Of course, there are other things that will have to become part of the overall solution, that have been touched upon. They have been mentioned and discussed in previous stages. But this big gap between the parties, in terms of equalizing wages between markets, has delayed us from getting to real work, and that's what we're trying to find ways to approach."
