European Trade Union Committee for Education

During the last days, many thousands of teachers and educators in different German towns have laid down their work again and joined the warning strikes. According to ETUCE Member organisation GEW, the reason for this was that even in the third round of negotiations which took place last week the employers were still not prepared to make concessions in negotiations. Apparently, they keep refusing to come up with a wage offer unless the unions do not step back on the issue of the supplementary pension provisions.

ETUCE had already reported that the unions ask for a wage increase of  5,5 %  but no less though than for 175 Euro more. They also call for a  collective agreement covering the employed teachers. At the same time, they reject to accept restrictions to additional pension provisions as suggested by TdL, the bargaining union of the German Länder which is the employers' association at the negotiating table.

The negotiations are foreseen to continue on 28 April 2015 and an agreement seems possible. However, the grouping of employed teachers into pay scale categories which is one of the central issues might continue to fail  for the possible lack of willingness for compromise among the employers. Nationwide in Germany about 200.000 employed teachers are affected by the failure to reach a fair agreement on their possible pay scale grouping.