Peel Region school strike: A primer on the labour dispute

Striking teachers walk the picket lines in Peel Region on Monday, May 4, 2015.

Thousands of students in Ontario did not attend classes Monday as public secondary-school teachers in the Peel Region hit the picket lines.

The teachers went on strike after their union and the Peel District School Board failed to reach an agreement over the weekend.

The Peel District School Board is the second largest in the country, comprising a large area west of Toronto including Mississauga, Brampton and Caledon.

Here's a primer about the strike and the issues that led to the labour dispute:

How many students are impacted?

About 42,000 students are being affected by the strike in Peel.

What else is being affected?

It's not just the classes that are being affected: extracurricular activities, field trips, school events and school buses are also cancelled throughout the labour dispute. The Peel board’s night-school classes, eLearning courses and elementary and secondary International Language classes are also cancelled.

What are the main issues?

There are two levels of bargaining for Ontario teachers: a local level between the union and the local school board, and a central level between the province, union leaders and school board associations.

Main monetary issues -- including wages, benefits and paid leave -- are negotiated at the central table, while working conditions specific to each school board are dealt with at the local table.

At the central level, the union has said they are most concerned about class sizes and teacher prep time.

At the local level, the union in Peel Region said teacher-performance appraisals and personnel files are the main issues, and not monetary issues.

In a press release, the Peel District School Board called the strike "irresponsible" and accused the Ontario Secondary School Teachers’ Federation of using the strike to put pressure on the province.

The board said it can't bargain at the local level until a deal has been reached with the province at the central level.

"In going ahead with the strike, they proved what boards have known all along -- there’s no sincere commitment by provincial OSSTF to reach a local settlement; they’re just using the excuse of not reaching local agreements as a cover for their strategy to pressure the provincial table," chair Janet McDougald said in a statement.

"Not only is that disingenuous, it’s actually irresponsible to disrupt the school year for 42,000 Peel secondary students as a political tactic. There is no legitimate reason for Peel schools to be on strike -- none."

But OSSTF President Paul Elliot rejected the notion, saying the union wouldn't consider striking if the local issues weren't serious.

"I wouldn't want to put this many people on the picket line, I wouldn't take that many students out of school and call it an irresponsible strike," he told CTV Toronto. "These things wouldn't be taken lightly, there's a lot of discussions that went on to reach this point."

Other school boards

Peel high school teachers are not the only ones who are on strike. Secondary school teachers in Sudbury are now entering their second week and a strike in Durham is in its third.

There are four other school boards that could soon see secondary school teachers hit the picket lines: Waterloo, Ottawa, Thunder Bay and Halton.

With files from CTV Toronto's Naomi Parness