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Deputy Prime Minister for Social Affairs and Education Minister Kim Sang-gon officially announced plans to form a “partnership” with the Korean Teachers and Education Workers’ Union (KTU) in a July 26 meeting with the union‘s executive. (by Shin So-young

Deputy Prime Minister for Social Affairs and Education Minister Kim Sang-gon officially announced plans to form a “partnership” with the Korean Teachers and Education Workers’ Union (KTU) in a July 26 meeting with the union’s executive. The announcement raises the possibility that a resolution to KTU’s non-legal union status could be in sight.

On July 26, Kim pledged to form a relationship with KTU as “partners in education” and said he would favorably consider a proposal by the union‘s policy council. He also stressed that the non-legal status issue “need to be resolved” and said he planned to work together with the Minister of Labor and Employment, who is yet to be officially appointed.

KTU, for its part, cautioned the same day against reading too much into Kim’s remarks about the union’s non-legal status, but said they showed a clear difference from the preceding Park Geun-hye administration (2013-16).

“There is great significance in the fact that the Ministry of Education, which has been hostile toward the KTU and cut off all dialogue for the past four years, has now recognized KTU’s existence and described it as a ‘partner,’” a KTU source said.

With the head of a government ministry announcing plans for continued policy discussions with the union - which remains outside the framework of the law - KTU is now looking forward to more active steps to address its non-legal status issue.

It was under the Park administration that KTU was stripped of its legal status as a union. In Oct. 2013, the Ministry of Employment and Labor (MOEL) notified the KTU was that it was “not regarded as a union,” citing the violation of the Act on the Establishment and Operation of Teachers‘ Unions by its bylaws acknowledging the union member status of teachers who had been dismissed from their jobs. The dismissed workers that the administration took issue with represented just nine out of 60,000 members.

As a presidential candidate in April, Moon Jae-in said he planned to reverse the revocation of KTU’s legal status early in his term. But since he took office as President, the administration has spun its wheels without finding a solution on the KTU legal status issue. Referring to the issue in a talk with reporters after taking office on July 5, Kim said he would “respect a Supreme Court decision upholding [the revocation of KTU’s status] while working together [with MOEL] to find ways of resolving it.” In Oct. 2013, KTU filed suit to have MOEL’s “no longer a union” notification overturned, but lost in both the first and second trials. The case is currently pending in the Supreme Court.

The fact that the non-legal status issue will not be easily resolved is a hurdle that Kim will have to clear. In its announcement of 100 governance tasks, the Moon administration’s governance planning advisory committee pledged to ratify key International Labour Organization (ILO) agreements. At the time, a key committee source said KTU’s non-legal status issue would “be resolved as a matter of course once we have ratified the Convention concerning Freedom of Association and Protection of the Right to Organise.” But various procedures will need to be followed for the convention to be ratified, including a Cabinet vote and agreement from the National Assembly.

In response, KTU has indicated that MOEL could exercise its authority to reverse the administrative order notifying it of its non-union status, regardless of the Supreme Court decision or ILO convention ratification. For this reason, many are watching to see the outcome of the “consultation among government offices” Kim said in a July 26 pledge to KTU that he would hold after the Minister of Labor and Employment takes office.

By Choi Sung-jin, staff reporter

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