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CCNTV6
  • 3 weeks ago
With teachers facing a host of issues as it pertains to their terms and conditions of employment, newly-elected President of the Trinidad and Tobago Unified Teachers' Association, Crystal Bevin Ashe, says the Association is now considering its legal options. Rynessa Cutting reports.
Transcript
00:00I'm a very calm individual, but when I represent tutor, I am no pussycat.
00:07I will roar like a lion. There's an appropriate time and place for everything.
00:09So if it is necessary for me to roar, I will roar.
00:13Newly elected tutor president Chris Dalash says he will fight to ensure teachers get their just due,
00:20starting with those who have been teaching for the last 15 plus years,
00:24without the teacher's title and remuneration due to what he calls a blunder on the Ministry of Education's part.
00:31I didn't just go and identify some courses and just do it on my own or anything like that.
00:37You are the Ministry of Education. You have the University of Trinidad and Tobago.
00:40You would have had the University of Southern Caribbean and so on.
00:43You told me what to do. I followed your instructions.
00:46So you're talking about 16 years. So these people are living on an assistant teacher's salary,
00:50which is basically 50 percent of what they would have been really receiving.
00:53For 16 years, man. And then you're saying every time tutor meets with you,
00:57you're saying that, well, we have to discuss and we have to see the way forward and the way forward.
01:02What is when, how many people have to die or teachers have to die and not receive their money?
01:07And then for us to decide, listen, let us make a decision.
01:10All right. There was a little blunder. There was an error.
01:13Maybe we would have advised the students inaccurately or something like that.
01:17No problem. Be a man. Step up to the plate and do what you have to do.
01:21Long-standing delays as it concerns the settlement of Unimed Health claims are also a priority for tutor at this time.
01:29You're going to the medical practitioner. You're doing your medical procedure and so on.
01:33I think you're submitting the claims. Everything is on time and so on.
01:35And you're waiting years, literally years, to get the claim.
01:38And even if you're waiting years and you know the end result will be positive,
01:42at this point in time, teachers and other education practitioners, they're not sure.
01:47They're not sure if they'll be getting any money.
01:49He laments promotion issues also plague educators,
01:52with more than 80% of schools having acting staff at the administrative levels.
01:57So a lot of the principals are being asked with the right acting before, after the name.
02:03Now they're being asked the right performing duties.
02:06What that means, Marlon, is that you are not entitled to any remuneration for that position,
02:12teachers of the opinion, that you should be compensated for what you're doing.
02:15It is only fair. It is only right. It is only just.
02:17So as I said, these sort of things, we have some serious issues.
02:23And Twitter really would be more...
02:27We would have to go... We are considering our legal options.
02:30Renasa Cutting, TV6 News.
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