THUNDER BAY – “My message to the Minister, as an elementary school parent myself, is I’m disappointed in her”.
“Today the Minister of Education could have given comfort to millions of Ontario parents whose children could see disruptions in their classrooms. She chose not to,” states PC Education Critic Lisa MacLeod. “The Minister approached the Ontario PC Caucus in July to support draft legislation on a wage freeze and to eliminate labour strife in our schools. Bill 115 is not perfect, in fact we put forward several amendments to improve the bill which were all defeated by the Liberal government”.
The comments from the PC critic come as the Ontario Government has rejected a tentative settlement reached between teachers and the McGuinty Government.
Nevertheless, we chose to support the bill because it did meet some of the fiscal parameters we laid out for a legislated wage freeze and as importantly, the liberals promised there would be no disruptions in the school year.
“We now know the Liberals mislead the House and Ontario’s parents on that score” complained the PC critic. “Classes in our elementary schools will be disrupted on Monday. And all out strikes could occur this month, pushing our education system toward the brink of chaos”.
“It is clear ETFO has no intention of backing down. It is equally clear the Minister of Education intends to do nothing about this. Laurel Broten has the tools to stop this in its tracks. Yet, all we get from her is she is disappointed. The Minister could have invoked her own law today. Instead she ignored it,” added MacLeod.