UK teachers oppose attacks on pay, conditions, pensions and government’s push for Academisation of schools
Since the pandemic struck, UK teachers are facing an acceleration of government attacks on their pay and conditions, the further marketisation of education, and victimisations.
The Conservative government’s reopening the economy, backed by Labour, is predicated on schools being kept open and has resulted in over 150,000 deaths. Schools are proven major vectors for spreading the virus, and children as well as adults can catch the virus and become seriously ill.
Despite the deaths of hundreds of educators from Covid-19, trade union representatives (reps) who raise health and safety concerns in schools are facing bullying, intimidation, and disciplinary action.
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Miners in Chiatura, Georgia strike to demand pay increase and improved conditions
Over 3,000 workers in the Georgian mining town of Chiatura joined an indefinite walkout on April 23 to demand Georgian Manganese grant a 50 percent pay rise, health insurance and environmental protections for the area near the mine.
According to the
Governance Monitoring Center, drivers working for the company in Chiatura wrote to the Minister of Health listing their demands hiring a lawyer to represent them rather than acting through the union and walked out on April 19. They were joined on April 23 by miners and other workers at Georgian Manganese.
Credits: Suzy Hazelwood via Pexels The NASUWT teachers union (National Association of Schoolmasters and Union of Women Teachers) has come out with accounts of redundancies of some staff who are all essential to the COVID safety measures which are needed in schools and the teachers’ union are also warning of there being funding shortfalls as well as the risk of jobs being lost in many schools, especially among support staff members, who may help with COVID control measures outside of the school day. The Department for Education have offered support upon seeing this to schools for increased staffing as well as raised safety costs.
#MakeSchoolsSafe (Image via Twitter courtesy of @NEUnion)
EAST SUSSEX, U.K. Leave it to educators and support staff to know what’s best for students in and out of the classroom as Covid-19’s global infection rate seeps into the new year.
No, it shouldn’t come as a surprise, rather as further proof that frontline workers know best they live within crisis daily.
As news broke before and during the holiday season of a new variant strain of the coronavirus, and a steady uptick of cases soon followed, government officials, including U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson, insisted schools were safe and should reopen on schedule Monday, January 4.
Jan 7, 2021
HUNDREDS of people have joined a call for teachers to be included in the next wave of Covid vaccinations.
Marina Mauger
By last night, more than 530 Islanders had signed a petition saying that teaching staff should be among the first people to receive a vaccine.
The petition states: ‘With emerging evidence that links schools to high infection rates with the new strains of the virus, this is surely a sensible course of action, and would give parents some degree of peace of mind.’
Although the petition was not launched by teaching unions, it has the backing of union members.