Lecturers at the Malta College for Arts, Science and Technology (MCAST) held a protest outside the administration building of the college in Paola as negotiations on their collective agreement drag on.
The protest was called by the Malta Union of Teachers (MUT) which last week said called on the college to review its position on the union's demands.
The union is set to issue a fresh set of industrial action directives in the afternoon, which will come into force this week.
For the past two years and nine months, MUT said it was involved in negotiations of a new collective agreement with MCAST. This collective agreement involves eight grades and includes Lecturing grades, Student Support Services grades, Student Mentors, Directors, Deputy Directors, Technicians grades, Learning Support Educators and Senior Research Officers.
The union said there was a deterioration of negotiations from MCAST which led MUT to declare a fresh trade dispute with MCAST.
MUT President Marco Bonnici gave a speech, saying that today, there was meant to be an opening ceremony in the Administration Building of the college to commemorate the start of a new academic year. Upon hearing of the protest, the opening ceremony, which many MUT members were invited to, was cancelled.
"This shows how grave a situation this is, the new leadership at MCAST only cares about appearances," Bonnici said.
He said that the newly appointed principal of the college is the only principal which the MUT expressed distrust in in his first month of his role. Bonnici said that this principal has been involved with MCAST for 20 years, yet has failed to negotiate with the MUT, as well as attend any negotiation meetings with the union and government.
Bonnici said that instead of dialoguing with the union on the collective agreement, which has been expired for almost three years, the new MCAST principal simply sent an email to the union with one solution: to go to arbitration procedures.
"For the principal, this is an easy solution, have someone else who has never even stepped foot in MCAST make the decision. For us, this is not a solution," Bonnici said, adding that if the union did not want arbitration, the Principal "threatened" MUT with legal action.
Bonnici challenged the Principal to proceed with legal action, and said that the MUT will not negotiate with him, but rather directly with government. He continued that the union did everything that was asked for, including issuing a finalised document of proposals for the new collective agreement.
"No one can point the finger towards us. We have no faith in negotiations led by the principal, and we will only negotiate with government," Bonnici said, adding that dialogue must continue to find solutions, without MCAST's leadership, which "has no interest in being affiliated with us."
Bonnici said that the situation is stagnant, and the MCAST leadership is treating educators like "naughty children" by cancelling the ceremony.
"This academic year will not be a normal one, as there is an expired collective agreement, and workers and educators are being affected," Bonnici said.
