The special regulations applicable to the working hours of early childhood education teachers and special teachers working at private daycare centres as well as the heads of daycare centres will remain nearly the same for the next two years.
OAJ and the Finnish Association of Private Care Providers (HALI) reached an agreement regarding the protocol of the collective agreement for the private social services sector when the collective agreement for the private social services sector negotiations were completed early last week.
“We were able to commence the protocol negotiations in good time before the end of the contract period. We had also reached a mutual view of the contents of the protocol. However, the negotiation result itself was only reached once the collective agreement for the private social services sector was agreed,” says OAJ’s Negotiations Director Petri Lindroos.
OAJ’s board of directors authorised the Negotiations Director and the chairperson to reach a negotiation result regarding the protocol as long as the negotiation result matched the municipal level.
OAJ and HALI agreed on a new working group
The new agreement will be valid for 25 months during the period 1 Aril 2020–30 April 2022. The pay rises will be in line with the general policy. The first general rise is 1.3% on 1 August 2020, and the second general rise is 1.5% on 1 July 2021. In addition, as of 1 September 2021, 0.6% will be used as the minimum rise for graded salaries. The Competitiveness Pact hours (kiky) will be abandoned on 31 August 2020, with the weekly hours reverting back to 38 hours and 20 minutes. The compensations of shop stewards and occupational safety and health representatives will be increased by 5% as of 1 August.
HALI and OAJ have agreed on a new working group for the upcoming agreement period. It will consider the effects on the private sector of moving municipalities’ early childhood education teachers, special teachers and heads of daycare centres to the collective agreement for the education sector.
“There were no major changes made to the contractual clauses of the protocol during this round of negotiations because agreement could not be reached with the employer regarding the content of the changes. The decree pertaining to the working hours applicable to planning, assessment and development remains the same even though the employer wanted to reduce it,” explains OAJ’s Special Advisor Kristiina Johansson.
Time for planning, assessment and development tasks
Approximately 13% of working time of the eligible heads of daycare centres, early childhood education teachers and special education teachers (38 h 20 min once the Competitiveness Pact has ended) is reserved for the planning, assessment and development of teaching and educational work of early childhood education and preschool education and for preparing the local curricula for early childhood education and care.
Planning, assessment and development is individual work carried out by teachers. However, some of these working hours can be used for team work and expert collaboration in accordance with the daycare centre’s guidelines if the matters discussed are related to the planning, assessment and development of teaching and educational work.
When planning working hours, the heads of daycare centres who take part in the teaching and education of groups of children must also take into account the time required for managing the daycare centre as well as supervisory work. Some of the working hours may be used outside the workplace according to the supervisor’s specific instructions.
Furthermore, a sufficient amount of working time should be allocated to parents’ evenings, parent meetings, mutual activity planning, other activity planning and preparation as well as home visits in accordance with the daycare centre’s guidelines. Working time should be allocated to parents’ evenings and other parent meetings in addition to the above-mentioned 13% of working time allocated to planning, assessment and development tasks.
“The tasks included in the planning, assessment and development time were not changed during the negotiations. Parent meetings as well as observations carried out in a group of children do not use this working time resource. The teacher performs the planning and assessment tasks outside the group of children,” Johansson specifies.
Clarifications regarding the definition of collective agreement days
The second part of the special provision regarding working time concerns the additional days off of the eligible heads of daycare centres, early childhood education teachers or special education teachers. The contents of these contractual clauses will also stay the same.
The persons performing these tasks will be granted one additional day off for each leave determination month, which includes at least 14 working days or days of leave. However, no more than five extra days off per year will be granted.
An amendment related to the accrual and use of additional days off for part-time employees was added to the agreement provision regarding additional days off. A part-time employee accrues additional days off in direct relation to the time they work compared to full, regular working time. The additional days off accrued by a part-time employee are rounded up to the closest full day in line with the rounding provisions.
When a day off is entered in advance in the shift list, the regular working hours will be reduced – when the Competitiveness Pact ends on 31 August 2020 – by 7 hours and 40 minutes for each additional day off. After the shift list has been drawn up, the working hours of the agreed days off will be reduced in accordance with working hours marked for the day off.
Most of the private daycare centres are included in HALI. The collective agreement for the private social services sector is generally applicable. Therefore, it is also applied to daycare centres where the employer is not organised. Of OAJ’s members, approximately 1,000 are employed by private daycare centres and 800 are subject to the collective agreement for the private social services sector.
Photo: Leena Koskela