Labour Court declines to recommend compensation for former St Catherines College worker

The Labour Court declined to recommend that St Catherines College of Education for Home Economics pay a worker compensation on the terms of an earlier recommendation for four former colleagues. The recommendation was signed on 23 December 2010. The college was represented by the Department of Education and Science, and the worker by IFUT. The Court found that the worker remained a teacher because he continued working in the profession, so it could consider the claim. But it said his circumstances differed from those of the four former colleagues: he had declined or not pursued redeployment options, chose early retirement without complaining about his severance terms and did not reserve his position. The Court also said he raised the claim late, after the earlier settlement had been accepted as full and final and without precedential value.