KRIS SIMS: Students are back in class and taxpayers are relieved

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Alberta students are back in the classroom after nearly a month away from school due to a teachers' strike.

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This is great news for parents and their children.

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This is a relief for taxpayers because the government has refused to give more money to this large state teachers' union.

This is what happened.

Initial deal

The Alberta government has committed $2.6 billion to boost education by offering teacher pay raises while hiring more educational assistants and new teachers.

The Alberta Teachers Association tentatively accepted the proposal in September, but members rejected it.

Teachers went on strike on October 6, kicking students out of schools and firing teachers from their jobs without strike pay.

After weeks of strike action, the union demanded an additional $2 billion from taxpayers.

The government rejected this demand and invited teachers to return to work, and the parties to the negotiations turned to mediation.

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Union leadership rejected an offer for teachers to return to work, upsetting some teachers.

An Edmonton teacher contacted the Taxpayers' Federation and said the government's proposed pay increase was acceptable and she disagreed with the union's demand for an additional $2 billion.

“This is completely irresponsible from a financial point of view, and any government that does this will be under the microscope for it,” the teacher said during an interview.

This teacher was right.

Alberta is on track to have $84.3 billion in debt, and interest on the debt will cost taxpayers $3 billion this year.

Albertans could not afford the union's demands to spend a total of $4.6 billion.

That amount of money will cover the provincial income tax bills of Edmonton's 1.2 million Albertans.

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It was a confrontation.

Students were kept from school, parents were stressed, taxpayers were kicked out, and teachers were not paid.

Premier Danielle Smith did the right thing by refusing to hand over another dollar of taxpayers' money.

The decision on whether to use this clause will be made by legal experts.

But taxpayers are relieved that the government didn't take the easy step of borrowing an extra $2 billion.

Alberta teachers now have the same contract their leadership tentatively agreed to back in September.

Most teachers will receive a 17% salary increase over four years.

New Alberta teachers will start paying approximately $71,000 per year, while teachers with seven years of experience will earn more than $100,000 per year, according to a salary chart posted on the government's website.

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Compare this to teacher salaries in other western provinces.

In Manitoba, equivalent salaries for new teachers start at about $70,300 per year, while teachers with seven years of experience earn about $95,700.

In Saskatchewan, equivalent salaries for new teachers start at $68,000 per year, while teachers with seven years of experience earn about $88,000.

In Surrey, British Columbia, the equivalent price for new teachers starts at about $64,500, while teachers with seven years of experience earn about $85,000.

To help cope with Alberta's growing population, the government is hiring 3,000 new teachers and 1,500 educational assistants.

Taxpayers are paying $8 billion to 100 schools to help with class sizes and special education.

“We need to target our support to individual classes. I would encourage the member opposite to watch the video that Chris Sims made with the teacher. She has four classrooms with 31 kids, one of them has 16 English language learners or code learners, and that's a classroom that we need to fix,” Smith told the legislature.

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As government labor groups threaten taxpayers with a general strike, readers might think Smith has taken a page from the late Prime Minister Ralph Klein's playbook by cutting teachers' pay by 5% and abolishing government wages to pay off the debt.

Smith didn't.

Increased funding

The government has increased education funding by 33% from 2021-22.

Most Alberta teachers are getting a 17% pay raise, and Smith is hiring 4,500 new teachers and aides.

Alberta teachers will become the highest paid teachers in Western Canada, while working about 190 days a year in the province without sales tax.

That's enough.

Taxpayers are being cheated out of being asked to pay an additional $2 billion.

Chris Sims is the Alberta Director of the Canadian Taxpayers Federation.

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