2.6 DEVELOPMENTS WITH REGARD TO EDUCATOR PROVISIONING According to House (2000:13) no government in liberal democracies can survive without
2.6.2 SHOWDOWN BETWEEN EDUCATOR UNIONS AND THE STATE WITH REGARD TO EDUCATOR PROVISIONING
In KZN, in order to keep within the allocated budget for personnel expenditure, the KZN DEC issued Circular HRM 1 of 1998 which stated that the services of temporary educators occupying substantive posts will be terminated at the end of February (KZN DEC 1998a:1). In a subsequent Circular, HRM 4 of 1998, the department explained its stance on the non-renewal of contracts of temporary educators. It advanced that it ‘was constrained to adopt certain austerity measures as a result of the severe cut-backs in its budget’ (KZN DEC 1998b:1).
In March 1998, KZN dismissed all temporary educators (7 000 educators). The SADTU accused the KZN department of education of being inconsistent in the selection of educators for dismissal and not acting in the spirit of national ELRC agreements which stipulated that only educators employed after July 1996 would be considered temporary.
Instead, the department dismissed educators employed before this date. The department then planned on selectively re-employing certain temporary educators based on curriculum needs in the schools. The Provincial Secretary of SADTU KZN, Ndaba Gcwabaza, declared that the re-appointment process was chaotic with some temporary educators being re-employed on a month to month contract basis whilst other educators were given contracts until the end of December 1998. Moreover, he added that Superintendents of Education Management (SEMs) were moving into schools and shifting educators around wily-nily. In some instances SEMs shifted educators to schools with full staff complements and ignored understaffed schools (The Educators Voice 1998b:14).
In the absence of nationally agreed norms and standards on educator provisioning, the SADTU argued that no rationalization or retrenchment should be taking place. The effects of the retrenchment of the temporary educators on the school system in KZN was
pointed out, namely, large class sizes due to the compression of classes and permanent educators taking on the additional workloads of the retrenched temporary educators (Naidoo 1998:5). The SADTU then tabled a proposal at national ELRC which included the following:
• A rejection of retrenchments of temporary educators and called for redeployment.
• A call for national norms and standards for post provisioning, arguing that provinces should not be given the power to decide these ratios.
• An indication that provinces did not have the capacity to deal with increased budget control.
• A statement that equity and redress would not be achieved if this was made dependent on each provincial department’s budget (Geyer 1998:2).
The state’s failure to respond to these proposals led the SADTU to declare a formal dispute with the state at national ELRC. Notwithstanding the SADTU’s proposal and dispute with the state, the National Minister of Education, Professor Bengu, went ahead and published regulations supporting the states proposals on educator provisioning (Geyer 1998:2).
The National Minister of Education noted that in terms of the Constitution of the Republic of South Africa, 108 of 1996, provincial legislatures are empowered to determine the funding of a provincial education department and the Labour Relations Act, 66 of 1995, provided for rationalization linked to operational requirements. The Minister, therefore, promulgated legislation (Government Regulation 593 and 594 of 1998) declaring that the following regulations will apply in respect of future post provisioning and rationalization processes:
• A Member of the Executive Council (MEC) must, after the provincial department of education’s budgetary allocation has been approved, and after the department has determined what proportion of the budgetary allocation should be allocated for the creation of educator posts in that province, determine the total educator establishment of such a department.
• The head of a provincial education department must allocate from the provincial pool of educators, educator posts to educational institutions and departmental offices, taking into account guidelines determined by the National Minister.
• In the event of a change in the number of posts created in a department or allocated to an educational institution or departmental office, the position of educators affected by such change must be dealt with in terms of the Labour Relations Act, 66 of 1995 (South Africa 1998b; South Africa 1998c).
These regulations meant that the provincial education budgets would form the basis for determining the provincial pool of educators. Further, the regulations would also devolve post provisioning norms to provinces. By divesting itself of the responsibility for determining national norms for educator provisioning, the National Department would force unions to negotiate with provinces individually. From the unions’ point of view the prospect of negotiating nine separate agreements was problematic, opening up the potential of splitting the organization in nine parts, thereby diluting the strength of the union (Fleisch 2002:57).
The new regulations led to a showdown between the National Minister of Education and educator unions. The SADTU was of the view that devolving powers to the provinces would fragment education and create nine different departments with different transformation agendas (Geyer & Skinner 1998:3). The matter eventually went to mediation. Given the tremendous pressure that was brought to bear on the state, the state at national ELRC was forced into an agreement with educator unions which included the following:
• The national minister will determine national norms and standards for educator post provisioning by endorsing this policy in the National Education Policy Act.
• The minister will enter into consultation with educator unions in the ELRC with a view to reaching an agreement on policy before it is determined.
• Temporary teacher contracts be extended until teachers can be redeployed.
• The withdrawal of Regulations 593 and 594 as well as the opening of negotiations on new regulations to replace Regulations 593 and 594 (Geyer 1998:2).
The agreement between the state and teacher unions culminated in the signing of ELRC Resolution 6 of 1998.
Fleisch (2002:57) points out that the unions had won a key victory, although they conceded some points. Whilst the condition that the provinces could determine the size of their educator post pool based on their budgets, the minister would set national learner- educator ratio targets.
At national ELRC, provinces were required to make submissions as to what learner educator ratios they could afford. Based on these ratios, the state set national norms and standards at a ceiling of 39:1 and a target of 37:1. Duncan Hindle (Grey 1998:2), Chief Director of Education Human Resources, argued that this was ‘an extremely favourable ratio’, representing ‘an abstract ceiling’ above which no province is allowed to go. He pointed out that many provinces had proposed ratios that were substantially below this ceiling. The only province to come in close to the ceiling of 39:1 was KZN. Hindle pointed out that the national average ratio was a manageable 35:1. The unions were far from happy with these norms. Their dissatisfaction stemmed from the fact that these norms do not represent actual class size. Edwin Pillay, Deputy President of SADTU added that class sizes may be as large as 55:1. The SADTU remained steadfast in its position that the national norm should be 32:1, and believed that the state’s proposal threatened the job security of educators and created the platform for retrenchments. The union vowed to continue to consult at a political level with regards to national norms and standards in order to influence policy (The Educators Voice 1998a:2; Grey 1998:3).
The DNE acknowledged in its Annual Report of 1998 that educator post provisioning was indeed a contentious issue and consequently it was seeking solutions to the problem.
They added that the department had engaged in a study of ‘appropriate proportions’ of resource inputs to education. Through an extensive process of consultation, research and piloting, the Department announced that it had developed a policy driven model for the distribution of educator posts. This model, the department claimed, allowed for educators
to be provided according to the complex curricular needs of each school. The model, it claims, was tested in all provinces and was to be implemented in 1999 (DNE 1998:68).