Negotiations between the teachers’ unions and the government are to be continued on Wednesday at 13:00. Deputy PM Beata Szydło has called upon the teachers to call off the strike for the time of examination period in schools. The head of the Polish Teachers’ Union Sławomir Broniarz has replied to the call and said that the unions won’t be suspending the protest.
The first part of Tuesday’s talks began at 8 a.m. in the Centre for "Dialogue" centre in Warsaw, however, they did not last for long as the cabinet meeting was scheduled at 10 a.m.
Both sides met again at 4 p.m. After the meeting, deputy PM Szydło told journalists that it was agreed that the next part of negotiations would be held on Wednesday at 1 p.m. Furthermore, she announced that "Solidarity" teachers’ union representatives have agreed to sign an agreement with the government.
"The "Solidarity" union is ready to sign an agreement with the government, however, as I had declared earlier on, we want to sign an agreement with all of the teachers’ unions," said Beata Szydło. She added that the government side is open to further talks that have been scheduled for Wednesday.
"Since we failed to find an agreement today, I have asked the unions to consider suspending the strike for the examination period," the deputy PM added.
In response to her call, the head of the Polish Teachers’ Union, Sławomir Broniarz said that the teachers will not suspend the strike.
"We have presented our offer in order to meet the government halfway. We’ve essentially dropped our main demand," said Broniarz.
"We’ve taken huge responsibility upon ourselves by doing so, however, we hope that the teachers would also welcome this proposal. However, we couldn’t have agreed to suspend the strike in exchange for only a promise of further talks," he added.
Autor: gf / Źródło: TVN24 News in English, PAP