Colleagues,
As you may well be aware, which you should be as your copies of ‘Teaching Today’ will have arrived, the NASUWT has undertaken to ballot its membership for action as a result of the unprecedented and relentless attack on state education, the teaching profession and the public sector.
Between 1997 and 2010 many gains were made by teachers in state education, which enabled us to focus on the one thing which we all consider to me the most important factor in our profession: learning and teaching and providing the best education possible to enable the young people of this country to make the progress they need to achieve the best possible outcomes in their lives. The requirement to cover for absent colleagues on a regular bases, guaranteed time for preparation, planning and assessment, the removal of the need to carry out tasks of an administrative nature that did not require the professional judgement of a teacher for their execution to name but three. Since the General Election of 2010 there has been a systematic change in attitude on the part of central government, and a number of items are seriously at risk.
- Changes in the performance management regulations which will link perfomance management to capability
- Increases in workload created by more government pronouncements that undermine the School Teachers’ Pay and Conditions Document
- Proposals to revisit the pay progression regulations
In addition we also have the proposed changes to our pension arrangements. Increased pension contributions are proposed, which will not actually be used to pay for pensions, but to contribute towards deficit reduction – a public sector tax; yet another increase in the retirement age, and a change of inflation link from RPI to CPI.
The most common argument used by government is that the current pension regulations are unaffordable, yet the cost as a percentage of GDP is projected to fall without any changes. In addition the total cost of all public sector pensions is £4.1bn annually, whereas the cost to the Exchequer of tax relief on the pensions of those earning over £150000 per annum (the top 1% of earners in this country) is £10bn.
It’s not often that we, as a union, take action, but the time is right to stand up for state education and the teaching profession.
I would urge you to vote yes to both questions.
Herefordshire NASUWT 