The general secretary of the Association of Secondary Teachers of Ireland (ASTI), Mr Charlie Lennon, will quit his post next week after the union executive endorsed a €200,000 settlement with him yesterday.
The 180-member central executive committee (CEC) voted by an overwhelming majority to accept the deal, worked out between lawyers for the ASTI and Mr Lennon last week. Only a handful of delegates opposed the deal, which gives Mr Lennon one year's salary, plus pension, car and other allowances.
Yesterday's decision clears the way for Mr Lennon to leave his post on December 12th next. He has now agreed to drop his High Court case against the union.
In return, the union has discontinued its investigation into alleged bogus expense claims by Mr Lennon.
The deputy general secretary, Mr John White, will be appointed acting general secretary this morning, as Mr Lennon is taking leave.
Mr White is expected to be appointed as interim general secretary shortly.
Yesterday, a move to install former president Mr Louis O'Flaherty as interim general secretary was withdrawn after it failed to muster sufficient support.
Mr O'Flaherty is a former editor of Astir, the ASTI journal. Mr Lennon has been general secretary of the ASTI for 13 years. In a statement prepared for the High Court last month, he was accused of making bogus expense claims by the ASTI treasurer, Ms Patricia Wroe.
But in his statement to the High Court, Mr Lennon claimed that the ASTI officers conducting the inquiry - ASTI president, Mr Pat Cahill and vice-president, Ms Susie Hall- had shown ill-will and prejudice towards him in the past. Both officers vehemently denied this claim.
The ASTI settlement comes at one of the most difficult periods in the union's history. It was severely rebuked recently by the Labour Court for its treatment of head office staff, with the court instructing it to "get its house in order". However, the ASTI's standing committee subsequently voted to reject the recommendation of the Labour Court, saying the court had only heard one side of the argument. Unions representing head office staff, however, labelled the decision an "appalling insult" to the staff of the ASTI and to the court. A month ago, the union was also forced to withdraw a ban on co-operation with the Junior Certificate science course after it was found by an arbitrator to have breached the national pay deal. It has also recently faced the prospect of losing the right to negotiate on behalf of its 17,000 members due to its failure to furnish audited accounts. This followed a dispute with the auditing firm, Deloitte and Touche.