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A second group of Nova Scotia school board workers has rejected a final contract offer and set a strike deadline. The 400 members of CUPE 955 who work for the Strait Regional School Board are looking for wage parity adjustments.

The unresolved issue continues to be equal wages with other school board workers, CUPE national representative Terry Goulding says. These workers have sent a strong message to their employer and to Nova Scotia education minister Jamie Muir that they are no longer prepared to work for dramatically different wages than those of their counterparts in other school boards across the province.

CUPE 955 will be in a legal strike position Mon., April 25. There are already 1,800 school board workers on strike at the neighbouring Cape Breton-Victoria School Board.

Jamie Muir needs to get his head out of the sand, Goulding says. The only way these two disputes are going to be resolved is if the province gets involved. They negotiate teachers wages provincially, school managers wages provincially. CUPE school board workers are tired of being treated differently. As the sole funder of school board wages in this province, Muir is being disingenuous in the extreme by claiming the province has no role to play.