Teachers are negotiating a new two-year contract after their current deal expired on August 31.

Preliminary talks began last Thursday and will resume again this week but Bermuda Union of Teachers (BUT) general secretary Michael Charles said the goal of parity with Government professionals was still paramount.

Last year teachers went on a strike and were given an average seven percent pay hike by a Government arbitration panel.

But Mr. Charles said there was still some way to go until teachers got parity. Currently a new teacher starts off on a salary of about $51,000 a year.

He said some of the union's experienced negotiators had withdrawn from the team because of the enormous amount of time they had spent in talks in recent years.

"We have been negotiating for two years in a row. They don't want to be out of their classes. We have lost a good people because of that."

Talks were due to begin in May but were delayed for various reason said Mr. Charles and then had to be postponed until the start of the new term. And teachers are still trying to get compensation after being docked pay in last year's strike while prison officers were paid during their strike in May despite ignoring an injunction for three days. Mr. Charles said: "We are still pursuing it."

He said the BUT lawyer was in touch with the Attorney General's office.

And he said the decision of Government not to pay its Bermuda Industrial Union strikers involved in last week's general strike did not weaken the BUT's resolve.

Mr. Charles said: "We still have a case."