Incoming president of the Jamaica Teachers’ Association (JTA) Mark Malabver is demanding an improved response from the Government on its latest wage offer to teachers as he prepares to take office.

“The response from the Government is not even worth the paper that Alice used out by Crab Circle. That is how insulted I feel personally for the teachers and what the Government has offered. I am saying no,” Malabver told the Jamaica Observer on Friday.

“We cannot under any circumstances accept that offer from the Government. We have rejected that outrightly. We did a follow-up meeting and they have committed to respond to us within four weeks. We are now at four weeks and we expect a far more favourable response from the Government.

“We will be having our annual conference in August and we want to be able to take it to the members in August, but if it is not a significantly improved offer then we will not be taking it to our members,” said Malabver, principal of Yallahs High School in St Thomas who has close ties with the Opposition People’s National Party (PNP).

He argued that the Government needs to demonstrate that it is serious by beginning to honour teachers with deeds instead of just words.

The incoming JTA president charged that the teachers need and deserve livable wages aligned to the Ernst and Young report which recommended sharp increases in the salaries paid to public sector workers, including teachers.

Malabver said there were several recommendations in the Ernst and Young report about where to place teachers in the public sector wage bands and these were ignored by the Government.

“All we are asking for is a livable wage. A competitive salary aligned to the recommendations out of the Ernst and Young report. The Government must demonstrate that commitment to education and to our teachers,” said Malabver.

He told the Observer that the JTA submitted a list of claims to the Ministry of Finance in November 2024. He said that there were 27 items of claims from the teachers which triggered a counter-proposal from the finance ministry.

“What I can confirm is that of the 27 items, the ministry rejected 24, and the other three items they either referred it back to the Ministry of Education or they placed a counter offer on the table. The counter offer they placed on the table is really an insult to the teachers.

“The counter offer to what we asked for is a four-year contract, instead of a three-year contract, and they want to give us zero per cent in the first year and 2.5 per cent increase in the other three years. We have rejected this outrightly. We have also submitted things around retention incentives for our teacher. They have rejected this as well,“ said Malabver.

“It demonstrates to the negotiation team that the Government is not serious about transformation in the country and that the Government is not serious about retaining our best and brightest minds to lead the drive for transformation of our education system.

“Our list of claims are grounded in research and international best practices and standards. It is unfortunate that the Government seems to want to take this thing for a joke,” added Malabver.

The incoming JTA president charged that teachers are leaving the island for greener pastures in such large numbers because they realise they are amongst the lowest paid in the Caribbean.

“Guess who are amongst the highest paid? Our politicians are. We want an offer that is meaningful that we can take back to our members,” he charged.

According to Malabver, there is a big problem because there was a commitment which came out of a negotiating exercise that the matter of the wages paid to teachers would be reviewed and favourable consideration would be given to properly align this with the report from Ernst and Young.

“Based on the offer placed on the table by the Government, they are not even considering the report. There are some red lines for us. We have been asking the Government to put back what is known as ‘remote inducement’ or ‘volatility allowance’. This is an allowance that is given to teachers in volatile communities or in deep-rural communities that are hard to serve. We call them hard-to-serve schools. The Government, over the last restructuring exercise, decided to grandfather this.

“What this means is that teachers who are there will continue to benefit from that. Those who are coming in would not benefit from that. We are saying that the conditions in those schools still exist and if it is that they are working in those schools they should benefit from that allowance. This is in keeping with the IDB [Inter-American Development Bank] report on education in Jamaica and is in keeping with the Orlando Patterson Report, and even the United Nations report, and the Government is not serious about the transformation that needs to take place in the country and pay the teachers a salary that is competitive and will cause the teacher to remain in Jamaica,” charged Malabver.