When the Anastasiades government prepared a bill that would put an end to the anti-educational ‘waiting list appointment system’ for public school teachers in 2015, the political parties, at the behest of teaching unions, delayed the change for as long as was possible. Although the education minister had set a transition period of seven years, the parties, urged by the unions, extended this to a staggering 12 years.

It was one of the most shamefully irresponsible decisions taken by the parties as they prolonged an appointment system that ensured the indiscriminate hiring of graduates as teachers, because they were on the list. They may have been unable to teach, could have been academically weak and totally disinterested in education, but there was no way to find out, because the only requirement for appointment was a university degree and registration on the ‘waiting list’. If a graduate was prepared to wait their turn, they were deemed eligible to teach!

We turned the lack of even the most basic selection process into a virtue, as it offered equal opportunities to the mediocre, incompetent and demotivated. None of the deputies on the House education committee were able to see any connection between this unmeritocratic appointment system and the declining standards of public education. Cyprus students regularly came close to the bottom of internation tests, while families that could afford to send their children to private schools.

When the law extending this criminal appointment system, which prioritized the employment prospects of graduates while completely disregarding the educational interest of students, was finally approved in 2015 it envisaged that for the next 12 years only half the new teaching appointments would be from the waiting list. The remaining half would be graduates who passed the state exams.

Now that the transitional period is nearing its end, the teaching unions are demanding that the waiting list remains in place, at least for another year, because the education ministry has imposed an ‘asphyxiating timeframe’ for dialogue. This is a classic union tactic – while everyone knew, for 12 years now, that the old discredited system would be scrapped, the teaching unions are claiming there is no time for discussion. By discussion, they mean negotiating the appointment of graduates that are still on the waiting list in spite of the new law coming into effect from 2027. They also want teachers on open-ended contracts or on fixed-term contracts to be hired through the back door, without sitting exams, which unions claimed were too difficult.

The education minister has made a mistake in consulting the unions. There is a law that must be enforced, but the unions want to negotiate with the government the provisions of the law that would not be implemented so that the criminal ‘waiting list’ is kept going. There is no room for compromise here. The minister must stick to the law, that for once puts the interests of students above those of graduates wanting a secure and well-paid job.