Commenting after the passing of an urgent motion on the pay and funding campaign at NEU Annual Conference (full resolution text below), Daniel Kebede, General Secretary of the National Education Union, said:
“After achieving an overwhelming majority vote in our recent indicative ballot, NEU conference committed to intensify its campaign to win a fully funded, above-inflation pay rise and greater resources for schools and colleges.
“Education is on its knees, struggling to cope with a crisis never seen before in our sector. And the responsibility for this lies squarely at the door of Secretary of State for Education Gillian Keegan and 14 years of mismanagement and underinvestment by a Government that does not care.
“Today, the NEU put this Government, and any new Government that follows it, on notice. We will move to a formal strike ballot in England and Wales if and when necessary to save our schools and colleges.
“This decision is a clear message to Gillian Keegan. If you want to fix the urgent recruitment and retention crisis and support schools and colleges to meet the rising tide of pupil needs, you must meet with the NEU to directly discuss the question of pay and funding.
“Having already clipped the wings of the School Teachers' Review Body by capping the cost envelope for pay at 1-2%, the Government cannot pass the buck.
“In a General Election year, every school leader, every teacher and every parent wants solutions to the crisis facing education. This crisis needs to be resolved. In the General Election campaign, educators and parents will be demanding that politicians commit to significant additional investment in education so that we value, recruit and retain the experienced and expert teachers and support staff we need.
“The Government needs to take action to solve the crisis that is threatening to destroy education. But if it – or any Government that comes after it – does not, we will.”
Editor’s Note
Pay and funding campaign
Conference congratulates officers, reps and members in achieving a strong result in our indicative ballot on pay and funding. Conference notes that in areas of greatest rep density, the turnout was highest.
Conference believes the strongest use of the ballot at this moment is to serve notice on Rishi Sunak, and Keir Starmer, that members are prepared to act industrially if they fail to deliver.
Conference notes the union has:
- Won £14.6 billion for education during the 2019 general election
- Saved lives by forcing government to change policy during the pandemic
- Campaigned alongside the London Mayor to implement free schools meals in primary schools
- Built support for alternatives to current assessment and accountability regimes
- Won £3 billion for education and a 6.5% pay rise for teachers in 2023
- That conference voted yesterday to prepare a timetable for action, aimed at winning a National Contract for Education by September 2025
Conference further believes that any formal ballot on pay and funding in coming months will now need to be expanded to include workload
Conference understands that Labour will likely form the next government. Whilst we will be able to work with a Labour government on some policy areas, we will need to campaign against them on others.
No matter who is in government, the bedrock of our power is collective organisation and action at the workplace.
Conference instructs the Executive to:
- Review, and learn from, the indicative ballot to build capacity to deliver local and national industrial action
- Campaign and recruit to increase rep density
- Use data from indicative ballot to identify and disseminate strong practice across districts
- In the interim, between an indicative and formal ballot campaign, build rep density and intensify the campaign on school funding levels and staffing provision
- Seek commitment from political parties to restore education funding across all sectors to pre 2010 per pupil funding levels, making clear the union is committed to a formal ballot should it be required
- Deliver the best possible result in our support staff indicative ballot to demonstrate our union has a key role to play in future victories for these workers
- Continue to campaign for a fully funded above inflation pay rise for 2024/25, and a Houghton style commission as a means of achieving a longer-term pay correction
- Continue fighting for increased funding to improve levels of pay, staffing and resources under the next government
- Run an election campaign foregrounding school and college funding, to influence policy commitments across parties
- Rebuild the School Cuts coalition and, as well as national activities, provide localised materials for members and allies to use in schools and communities
- Seek pledges of support from prospective parliamentary candidates and hold signatories to account if elected
- Campaign, whatever the government, to break the stranglehold of neo-liberal policy on assessment, curriculum, and accountability
- Campaign to revoke minimum balloting legislation that hinders the democratic freedom of trade unions to take industrial action.
- Take note of the 67% turnout by teachers in sixth form colleges, in the light of which our network of reps in the sector will need to consider next steps, including a possible formal ballot, to fit the SFCA negotiating cycle
- Intensify campaigning and mobilising our members prior to the Government’s pay offer and funding settlement for 2024/2025. Present the pay and funding offer to members in a snap poll, and if rejected with a convincing turnout, move to a formal ballot
- Use the opportunity of changes to the STPCD to seek to eliminate PRP in as many employers as possible and to push on from this to campaigns on primary TLRs and other pay issues
- Use further changes to the STPCD which introduces a list of tasks a teacher cannot be required to perform to organise on workload and to push on from these to further workplace workload demands
- Produce materials for branches to organise around these issues as soon as possible in the summer term, where possible these should be easily editable to make them bespoke for each employer
- Collect data from all branches and MAT reps on the progress of the above to publicise progress and identify where resources can be directed to win against intransigent employers
- Use these campaigns to recruit and activate reps to build the union’s strength in the workplace and capacity to win future national ballots