Article content

With job action on the part of Ontario’s teachers’ unions entering its fourth month, students and their parents are feeling the pain. Each week, parents are forced to figure out whether their children will get caught up in the complex web of rotating strikes taking place throughout the province.

Today, the unions plan to hold yet another rally at Queen’s Park, while Catholic teachers go on strike throughout the province and high school teachers hold rotating strikes. Elementary teachers are threatening to walk out next week. With four teachers’ unions all waging their own campaigns, it can be hard to keep up. It’s little wonder that a recent poll found that a plurality of Ontarians now support making education an essential service.

We apologize, but this video has failed to load.

tap here to see other videos from our team. Try refreshing your browser, or Jesse Kline: Ford government calls the teachers’ bluff Back to video

But why? What’s stopping a deal from happening now?

Parents no longer care how this deal is negotiated.

From the start, Ontario teachers, who are already the highest paid in the country, have insisted that this is about maintaining the quality of education for Ontario students, not lining their bank accounts. Yet every time the government makes concessions on other issues, the unions stubbornly refuse to play ball.