- The Basque Government will equate the salary of the teachers of the centres agreed with that of the Basque public school. The equalisation will be progressive, the process will end in 2027 and to start the process EUR 67 million will be allocated from this year’s public budgets. The initiative is part of the new Education Act promoted by the Basque Government.
The Basque Government will amend the Budget Act in order to be able to allocate these EUR 67 million to the salaries of the teachers concerted in the Basque Country. These EUR 67 million will be earmarked for the salaries of 2023-2024 (the law is retroactive and will therefore extend to 2023), but the matching process will end in 2027.
Among other things, the agreement relates to the recent Education Act approved by the Basque Government, which aims to “guarantee free and quality learning in public funded concerted centres”. In other words, the fees charged to families in ikastolas and in Christian schools should be discontinued “because concerted centres will not have to reflect the consequences of wage increases through their quotas”, according to the Education Counsellor, Begoña Pedrosa. Pedrosa said that, although it is prohibited by law, there are still centers that charge the fee, and they are "working on it".
It is based on the formula of the Basque Public Education Service, the controversial formula approved by the new Basque education law. Public school officials do not see the formula with good eyes, and this is what Lurdes Imaz, the coordinator of the association of parents EHIGE, recently exposed the law, summarized: “The public network must compete with a concerted network better funded by public money, which will be worse than before with this law.”
Begoña Pedrosa pointed out that the Basque Public Education Service will also impose additional obligations on all educational establishments, such as transparency and access for staff.