The Office of the Commissioner for Children has urged the government and educators to "walk the talk" on children’s rights and agree on a way forward to fix problems that have left hundreds of students without a teacher.
"The Office appeals to all stakeholders to walk the talk on children’s rights and agree on a way forward that upholds these rights," the Office said in a statement on Friday.
The Malta Union of Teachers (MUT) had registered an industrial dispute over the way some 150 peripatetic (support) teachers were deployed to primary school classes on the eve of the start of the school year. In turn, the government had argued that the move would leave a 'hundred' classes without teachers and tried to stop the union's action. This attempt to stop MUT was however turned down by the Civil Court.
The Office also expressed its disappointment that in the ongoing industrial dispute between the Ministry for Education and the teachers’ unions over how to make good for a shortage of teachers created by COVID-19 public health safety measures in schools, "the principle of the best interests of children has been anything but a primary consideration".
"This goes against Article 3 of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child. Consequently, due to this lack of consideration of the best interests of children by the unions, a number of primary schools classes are still without a teacher as a result of the industrial dispute," the office said.
In the face of an emergency situation, one would have expected all parties to abandon the politics and tactics of confrontation and adopt a more collaborative approach in order to agree on temporary measures, it said. This would allow the education system to weather the COVID-19 storm for the benefit of all children.
"Sadly, the pandemic seems to have exacerbated the confrontation, as recently evidenced by the industrial dispute by the teachers’ unions and the subsequent court application by the Education Ministry for a prohibitory injunction against the measures ordered by the unions.
"The Office cannot but express dismay at the recent court ruling which championed the right of the teachers’ unions to protest a decision by the Education Ministry over the right of children to an education."
According to the Commissioner's Office, "it beggars belief" that the judge presiding over the case is quoted as having said that “there were no rights for the court to protect”, when the right of children to education is guaranteed by Article 3 of Education Act, 2019, which has just come into force.
"This clearly shows that Malta’s legal framework for children’s rights needs to be strengthened in order to give legal force to the Convention and make children’s rights legally binding," the Office said.