Education is now front and center in the unions’ eleven-point demand, but Minister Francis Fonseca says many of the concerns are already being addressed. The unions want vacation time restored, salary and licensing disputes settled, and greater financial support for the University of Belize, including its full fifteen-million-dollar subvention. Fonseca says the demands caught him off guard because his ministry is already working toward solutions.
Francis Fonseca
Francis Fonseca, Minister of Education
“We’ve been discussing around the table between education, just education, and BNTU. We’ve been talking about those, so I was surprised that they found themselves in some broader discussion. But nonetheless, we are prepared to respond to those. I think there are absolutely areas where we can find common ground and compromise. So we’re gonna work on that. That’s important points. In terms of UB, when we came in the subvention, the monthly subvention was 7.5 million when we came into office. It’s now at 10 million. We’re not at the 15 million we promised, but it’s, we’ve gone… We came in during COVID. So it took us about two years before we started adding on. Now it’s at $10 million this year, this fiscal year. And we should not forget that every year, and it’s – this has gone up significantly over the past five years, we contribute another maybe $20 million to UB through scholarships and financial assistance to students. The Ministry of Education, just the ministry. So that’s significant. It’s significant. So UB is our national university. We’re always prepared to sit down with them and discuss how we can improve our partnership how we can strengthen UB.”
The Belize National Teachers’ Union expects a positive response to its demands within ninety days, while government has until the start of the next financial year to address the University of Belize’s subvention request.
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