Union hoping for end to row

The Barbados Secondary Teachers’ Union (BSTU) has asked the Ministry of Education to try to stop Alexandra School principal Jeff Broomes from behaving like “he’s a law unto himself”. But the outspoken headmaster charged yesterday that the union was responsible for the latest controversy at the school and was only being “provocative and contentious”. The new row centres on the union’s failure to gain access to the St Peter school compound on Sunday evening to hold a meeting with the parent-teacher association and the old scholars. BSTU president Mary Redman said the board of directors of the secondary school had given permission for the union to use the premises but her officers, parents and former students still found the gates closed. Broomes told the DAILY NATION that statements to the effect that the board had given the union the go-ahead to use the complex were “grossly untrue”. He insisted: “No permission whatsoever was given for the union to hold a meeting at the school Sunday. They knew they had no permission. “They are just trying to be provocative and contentious and clearly so.” However, Redman faxed to the media what she said were copies of a letter from the board and of an entry from the school’s porters/guards’ logbook confirming that the union had permission to hold the meeting  there. Redman said Broomes had gotten his facts wrong. “We have written the Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Education and we have complained that, yet again, the principal, Mr Broomes, has not followed the directives coming from those in authority,” she told the DAILY NATION. “We have recommended that some action should be taken in this regard, whatever sanctions are in place for such actions.” She added: “Mr Broomes obviously cannot continue to behave as if he is a law unto himself and as if there is no one in authority to whom he has to answer and whose law he ought to obey. “He must obey instructions – just like everybody else in the Public Service.” Relations between the union and the principal have been sour for some time, with unionists accusing Broomes of acting in a dictatorial fashion and the principal saying that he was firm but fair in seeking the best deal for students, his school and education. (TY)