TEACHERS in the NEU (National Education Union) are taking mass strike action this week in their fight for a national 12% pay rise for all members, as they step up their fight against the Tories’ miserable 3.5% pay cutting offer.
On the eve of this week’s action the NEU has condemned some school leaders for attempting to intimidate members by ‘naming’ them as strikers in letters to parents.
NEU members in England will walk out tomorrow in the North, North West, and Yorkshire and the Humber, on Wednesday in the East Midlands, West Midlands, and East and on Thursday teachers in London, the South East and the South West will strike.
In Wales, members are also set to strike on Thursday after postponing action on 14 February following talks with the Welsh government.
Union members are not required to inform their employers if they plan to strike, but Education Secretary Gillian Keegan has threatened to use the new Tory anti-strike legislation against them after more than 18,000 schools closed during the national strike on 1st February.
Encouraging anti-strike heads to ‘name and shame’ striking staff members, Keegan said she was ‘shocked’ to learn that teachers are not required to inform their employers if they plan to strike, and said she would seek to ‘amend the loophole’.
The NEU has reminding any staff who are being pressured by unsupportive heads or trust chief executives that they do not have to declare whether they are striking in advance.
The NEU yesterday called the ‘naming and shaming’ of those taking action an ‘appalling’ attempt to put pressure on teachers not to make a stand on pay.
Mary Bousted, joint general secretary of the NEU, said: ‘There are heads who have been swayed by very heavy guidance from the Department for Education that they must keep schools open at all costs by employing agency staff’ and warned that pressure, which is being reported at a minority of schools across the country, is ‘intimidation and bullying’, adding: ‘Publishing the names of striking teachers is invidious. It is appalling behaviour.’
Geoff Barton, general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders union, said: ‘We’ve advised members that however fraught things might feel now, you need to make sure that relationships with your staff are good in the long term. Most have followed that.’
