Valditara: teachers, with new Ccnl and wedge cut, 17% increase in 2 years

Giuseppe Valditara returns to the subject of teachers' salaries, and in response to criticism from CGIL and the Dem secretary, Elly Schlein, emphasises that the new Ccnl and the confirmation of the cut in the wedge will lead to an average 17% increase in teachers' salaries over two years. In a long Youtube video, the Minister of Education takes stock of the salary increases for Italian teachers, after the controversy that arose following the OECD data in recent days.

Valditara recalled that since 2009 school staff had to wait until 2020, 11 years then, to have a new contract. In 2020, the increase for teachers was 3.48%; in 2023 (in 3 weeks) a new contract was closed with increases of 3.9%, then thanks to the '300 million that I allocated to bargaining by unblocking them, whereas before they were destined to finance so many projects', the overall increase was 4.5%, 'the most important in the last 20 years'.

In the last financial act, EUR 3 billion were earmarked for the new national collective agreement, which the minister hopes will be closed by December, and which will recognise a 5.8% increase. "It had never been seen that in two years contracts were signed for 10.3%," Valditara said, "to which must be added the 6-7% salary related to the wedge cut. An average increase of 17% in 2 years, when for so many years the maximum increase had been 3.48%'.

According to an Invalsi study,' the minister recalled, 'if until 2022 the Italian position was effectively that of tail-end for teachers' salaries, in 2023, thanks to the contract signed, the situation changed and Italy overtook France, Finland and Portugal for staff with at least 15 years' seniority. At the end of their career, the salary of an Italian teacher is higher than that of their Swedish colleagues, for example'.

'It is not at all true,' Valditara concluded, 'that the government has forgotten about the Italian school, on the contrary, it has allocated to it the largest contractual increases to date, with an overall increase of around 17%, also taking into account the cut in the tax wedge. We still need to improve, we must not be satisfied, but we must not be catastrophists'.