TEACHERS DEMAND A NATIONAL COMMISSION ON PAY

NASUWT – The Teachers’ Union has called for the creation of a new National Commission on Teachers’ Pay to raise the status of the teaching profession, restore competitiveness, and halt the real terms decline in teachers’ pay.

The NASUWT believes that the National Commission should be responsible for working with the profession, employers and the Government to restore the independence of the pay review body process, ending pay stagnation and jumpstarting the long term recovery of teachers’ pay.

A National Commission on Teachers’ pay should be established by Government with the agreement of unions and employers. The next Government should be obliged to act on the Commission’s decisions and recommendations.

In a recent Pay Survey, 88% of NASUWT members described themselves as “somewhat or very worried” about their current financial situation, and in the past twelve months, 63% say that financial worries have impacted their working life. 11% have taken a second job.

NASUWT General Secretary, Dr Patrick Roach, said:

“The next general election must be a turning point for our education service and for the country’s teachers. Teachers have lost confidence in the Government’s ability to fix the problems of the last 14 years.

“The NASUWT is calling on all parties to commit to delivering a New Deal for Teachers, at the heart of which must be a national workforce plan to end the teacher recruitment and retention crisis.

“Teachers have seen their pay fall in real terms by as much as 30% over the last decade. This is not a basis for recruiting or retaining the teachers needed to provide the world-class educational opportunities that children and young people deserve.

“A new National Commission should be charged with boosting teachers’ pay.

“We are calling today for a new National Commission on Teachers’ Pay that is tasked with making teaching the profession of first choice once again by working with the profession and the Government, after the general election, to secure the foundations for a renewed national framework of pay and conditions across all state-funded schools.

“We know the scale of the challenge any new Government will face after 14 years of neglect and decline.Our members want to see lasting solutions that will repair our broken system and restore the status of teachers.

“A National Commission on Teachers’ Pay could help to deliver that progress and put teachers back at the top of the agenda for Government.

“The teaching profession is in the midst of a crisis of recruitment, retention and morale, with 40,000 teachers leaving in the last year alone.

“Time and time again, we have asked this Government to commit to restoring teachers’ pay and they have failed to act.

“We need a government that will match teachers’ ambitions for a world-class education service, and that means a new government that will deliver a New Deal for Teachers.”