Last year, in your hundreds of thousands, you stood up for education.
Our brilliant Pay Up! Save our Schools strike action secured a funded 6.5 per cent increase in teachers’ pay and key concessions on workload and performance-related pay.
But when you voted to accept that offer, we said that the day could come when we would once again ask you to take action to save our schools.
Saturday 2 March 2024 – is that day.
Today we launch our preliminary electronic ballot for teachers to ask whether you would be prepared to strike to make sure educators get a fully funded, inflation-plus pay increase and that the Government commits further funding to improve staffing levels in schools and colleges.
We are asking all teachers in state-funded schools in England and Wales and sixth form colleges in England to vote YES, to help us heap pressure on a disgraceful Government that does not care about us, our schools or the children we teach.
This week that Government’s evidence to the review body that recommends teacher pay stopped short of putting a figure on the pay rise ministers think you should get, but said teachers’ pay needs to return to a ‘more sustainable’ level.
This is barely concealed code for another real terms pay cut for teachers, with no extra funding for schools and colleges to halt cuts and improve staffing levels.
This Government has overseen and deepened the worst crisis in education for a generation.
Education staff are leaving the profession in droves. And there aren’t enough coming in to replace them.
Desperate school staff shortages result in huge gaps in the number of subject specialist teachers needed to teach our children properly.
On school funding, the news is no better. There is no extra money to fix the shocking state of our school estate, where hundreds of buildings are out of action due to crumbly concrete, where water pours in through leaky ceilings, where mould and peeling paintwork are regular features of the classroom wall.