The Commissioner for Children has called on teachers' unions to collaborate over the redeployment of student-teachers at schools suffering teacher shortages. 

The commissioner's warning followed confirmation by the university's Education Faculty dean that 10 student-teachers in their final study year have had their teaching practice shifted to a different school, as the education authorities grapple to address a teacher shortage in primary schools. 

Last week, the Office of the Commissioner for Children 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 Education Ministry had initially resorted to assigning peripatetic teachers to these classes, but its plans were stopped in their tracks by UPE and fellow teachers' union the Malta Union of Teachers.

A ministry bid to have union directives declared illegal was waved aside by the courts. 

On Wednesday, the UPE said that it has information that the reassignment of student-teachers is a stop-gap measure intended to tide classes over until the Christmas break. 

On Thursday, the Office of the Commissioner for Children expressed "dismay" that its appeal had been ignored.

"This is painfully evident in the latest developments where the UPE is now objecting to the redeployment of fully fletched student-teachers to schools where there are teacher shortages and seems to be resisting any attempt at finding a reasonable and workable solution.

"The office reiterates that in an emergency situation like the one faced by children and the education sector for almost the past two years, unions in particular need to be responsible by collaborating with rather than confronting one another in order to find the best solutions to guarantee children their education rights," it said in a statement.

Children should not be caught in the crossfire between stakeholders, the commissioner warned.

The pandemic, which has caused great damage to children’s education, should be a time of industrial truce, not warfare, it added, reiterating its appeal for children’s rights to be given legal force and judicial representation.

Without this, they are "easy prey to empty rhetoric and narrow sectoral interests", it said.