Solid support for the strike

Members of the NUT across the country have turned out in force to stand up against attacks on our pensions. In East Sussex more than half of all schools were completely closed, with the majority of others closed to many or most pupils.

Thousands of trade unionists, from NUT, NASUWT, ATL, UCU, Unison, GMB, Unite, PCS and the many smaller craft unions attended rallies across the region. I was privileged to speak at the Eastbourne Rally, which had originally been scheduled to take place at the Unite Eastbourne centre. It became clear by 10.30 that there was no way we could all fit into the room, so an impromptu rally was staged at Eastbourne Bandstand, after which more than 500 people marched into the Town Centre.

The campaign goes on to press the Government to revalue the scheme, and enter into negotiations based on the reality of our pensions which are (as a result of difficult decisions in 2005-6) affordable, sustainable and fair: the costs are on course to fall.

Also, it is absolutely central to the campaign that the Government and the tabloid press are not allowed to label this as a public vs. private sector conflict. The scandal of inadequate pension provision in the private sector also needs to be urgently addresses.

I would urge members once again to read the pamphlet Fair Pensions for All produced by the NUT, PCS, UCU and Unite in conjunction with the National Pensioners Convention. This looks at the whole issue of pension provision, from the State Pension, through the attacks on occupational pensions, and gives a whole wealth of information that will help you when you discuss our campaign- as you must- with friends, family and colleagues.

Visit the NUT Website for the latest on the campaign to defend teachers pensions.

Murdoch censors the TUC !

Yesterday The Sun asked the TUC General Secretary Brendan Barber to write 200 words setting out the case for the day of action. They are not in today’s paper. We publish them here, please spread them:

"This government cancelled the tax on bankers’ bonuses. Instead it has brought in a nurses’, teachers’ and lollipop ladies’ tax.

This is what the increase in pension contributions – around £1,000 a... ...year for a nurse – really means. It is not paying for pensions but going straight to the Treasury to fill the hole left by the bonus tax.

It takes a lot to get Brits to strike. Yet the government has driven millions of its own staff to stop work, including unions that have never gone on strike before such as head-teachers. They are not stupid or manipulated by union leaders, but ordinary decent people doing important jobs taking a stand as a last resort.

We know the strike will cause difficulties today, and we regret that. But it’s proved to be the only language the government understands.

I’ve been leading talks with ministers for months. But they were going nowhere. It’s only when we called a day of action that government started to move. Ministers should listen carefully today to their staff, and get stuck into trying to reach the fair negotiated settlement that unions want."

Fair Pensions for ALL: The facts !

Fair Pensions for All is a pamphlet produced jointly with Unite, PCS, UCU and the National Pensioners Convention. This document dispels the myths about public sector pensions, exposes the scandal of pension provision in the private sector and sets out the compelling case for fair pensions for all.

• The UK currently has the fourth lowest state pension in the EU- only Estonia, Latvia and Cyprus pay less to keep pensioners in security and dignity in old age. The basic state pension is currently £102 a week, worth only 57% of the government’s official weekly pensioner poverty level of £178


• More than two million UK pensioers officially live below the poverty line, with a further million in fuel poverty.


• Just over a decade ago nearly half of all private sector workers were in a workplace pension scheme; today it is only a third.


• However, while pensions have been ripped away from ordinary workers, the directors of large companies continue to net very generous pensions averaging £175,000 per year in retirement. These generous fat cat schemes at the top lapped up the bulk of the £37.6bn in tax relief that private sector pensions get every year.


• The Hutton report “firmly rejected the claim that current public service pensions are ‘gold plated’ …the median payment is around £5,600”. This equates to just over £100 per week in retirement. For a woman worker in local government the average pension is just £2,600.
  

Download the full facts, in the leaflet HERE

Teachers Pensions: £46.4 BILLION more paid in than out !

The NUT today provides further support for the argument that public sector pensions are affordable and fair.

The NUT research shows that, during the lifetime of the Teachers' Pension Scheme (TPS), £46.4bn more has been paid into the scheme than has been paid out.

The NUT has calculated the total payments into and from the TPS over the period 1923 to date, using its official valuation reports and accounts. Adjusting these figures in line with GDP growth shows that at least £46.4bn more in current prices has been paid into the TPS in contributions over the years than has been paid out in pensions.

This follows earlier reports by the National Audit Office and the House of Commons Public Accounts Committee which show that the long term costs of the TPS are already declining following earlier reforms. The long term picture contrasts sharply with the Government's arguments that the current imbalance between contributions and payments makes teachers' pensions unsustainable.

Christine Blower, General Secretary of the National Union of Teachers, the largest teachers’ union, said:

"The NUT's research proves two points. First, funding public sector pensions is a complex area – we won't allow our opponents simply to ignore those parts of the story that don't suit them. Second, it is a long term issue – policies shouldn't be driven by short term considerations.

“There is no £46.4 billion to hand. The fact is, however, that the Government has accepted a long series of cheap loans from teachers’ pension contributions before complaining about paying the pensions promised in return."

NUT LGBT Conference

I was once again privileged to chair the 18th NUT Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Trans Teachers Conference at Hamilton House on 12th November.

After a warm welcome from the Vice-President of the Union, Marilyn Harrop, we welcomed not one but two excellent keynote speakers.

Elly Barnes has pioneered LGBT equality teaching at her school, Stoke Newington High School in Hackney. Her celebrations of LGBT History Month have become a major event in the school's calendar, and she now runs training sessions for teachers in other schools. Elly was named #1 on the Independent on Sunday's Pink List for her work combating homophobia in schools. Elly once again blew us away with the presentation of how this event can develop and embed in the life of the school, and presented us with a wealth of ideas and resources for use in our own schools.

John Amaechi was the first British player to appear in the NBA Basketball league. After a distinguished career in professional basketball, he is a psychologist, New York Times best-selling Author and social entrepreneur working in both the US and the Europe. He is involved with a youth sports club in Manchester where he uses basketball and football to develop emotional literacy with young people, and was recently awarded the OBE. John was an inspiring, entertaining and often challenging speaker.

Delegates took part in a range of workshops that were all well received. These included

Trans teachers-sharing experiences; Magna Carta School students presenting their resource – Homophobia – our closeted education; Celebrating the Classroom run by Tony and Sue from Schools OUT, and a workshop on the new Public Sector Equality Duty run by Jonathan Timbers of the EHRC.

The conference debated the motion that we would put forward to the main NUT Annual Conference in Torquay next year. It was agreed that we send a motion entitled Defending LGBT Rights, and the text can be read here.


The afternoon closed with a panel discussion with Annette Pryce, Nigel Tart, Ros MacNeil of the Union's Equalities Department and myself about being an "out" LGBT Teacher in schools. This developed into a really engaging discussion, with many conference delegates sharing their experiences, ideas and questions.

NUT members will elect the first dedicated LGBT Representative to the National Executive this January. Members must identify as LGBT and register for a vote. To find out more, please visit the membership section of the NUT Website.

Executive Report: November 2011

The full executive met on 10th November, at Hamilton House.


Christine Blower opened by reporting that the NAHT had voted in favour of taking strike action with a healthy majority- although this now goes to their national executive for consideration. Unison has also voted to strike on November 30th. GMB, Prospect and the FDA ballots continue, as does the NAHT.

The booklet Fair Pensions for All is being launched and is being sent out soon- this is about pensions in general: looking at public, private and state. It points out that only Estonia, Latvia and Cyprus have lower state pensions than the UK, and unpicks the scandal about private pension provision in this country.

Deputy General Secretary Kevin Courtney congratulated Emily and Chris, our parliamentary team, for the Lobby of Parliament, where over 2,000 lobbied their MP over pensions. 75% of MPs were seen on the day, and others are being followed up in their own constituency. Colleagues had reported that a number of Tory MPs at the Lobby of Parliament appeared to be rather discomforted by the fact that there had been no revaluation. Some MP's had been under the misapprehension that a valuation had been done; others seemed to be under the impression that it was somehow difficult to carry out a valuation of an "unfunded" (ie. not a separate pot of money) scheme. It isn't and had been done regularly for many years !

The “concessions” -such as they are- from Danny Alexander were outlined.

The protection for members in the 50-60 age bracket (55-65 for members in the LGPS) is indeed a concession that we have won, however is it enough to sell other colleagues down the river ?


The change in accrual rates from 65ths to 60ths is not an “improvement”: simply retaining where we are now. The original plans were a worsening of accrual rates, so we are back where we started (the older scheme is calculated on 80ths, but also includes the lump sum of 3/80ths for every year of service)

The government claims that these will be the last changes to the pension system "for a generation": but no future government can be bound to it. The mechanism for automatic increases in retirement age mean that colleagues could be forced

Kevin noted that it is the action and campaigning by the NUT and the other trade unions that has pressed the Government to these concessions- however we need to win more. At this moment, no further dates have been set for the central negotiations, which suggests that the Government is not willing to negotiate further, except in the scheme-specific talks. All of these are being restrained within the Government’s imposed “cost ceiling”. All of the unions are in agreement that there is no realistic prospect of a deal while this arbitrary cost ceiling is in place.

We are actively taking part in scheme-specific negotiation over details , but are not prepared to concede our key principles. We will be carrying out a survey of members to gauge their feelings on the Government’s latest position, and to inform the executive on the opinion of the members we represent.

Kevin urged executive members and their activists to build for the 30th November. It is also important to counter the Government spin- especially the claims that somehow members will get higher pensions- this is not a fair comparison as they are looking at teachers working to 68 without taking into account career progression through career-averaging. A range of material will be coming into schools and to members soon.


I raised with Kevin the importance of continuing to hammer home the point that the Government continues to refuse to carry out the long-overdue revaluation of the scheme, to tell us how much money is in there. It was reported that Danny Alexander has stated in Parliament that there won’t be a revaluation until the changes have been made ! This is a key point to keep pressing whenever we are making our point in this dispute.


Senior Solicitor Clive Romain reported on the legal challenge to the imposed move in calculating pension increases (including for existing retired teachers) from RPI to CPI inflation. After a three day hearing, we were now waiting for a judgment- likely to be before the 30th November !


Christine also reported on the 20th Black Teachers conference was extremely well supported: Christine enjoyed the sessions she was able to attend. Also looking forward to the LGBT Conference this weekend (that I shall be chairing) Christine noted that Max Hyde has been invited to chair the next TUC Women's Conference.


The full executive later voted unanimously to endorse the position taken by Christine and Kevin in the negotiations.

PSHE Consultation

As a former Head of Department for PSHE and Citizenship, I have a particular concern about the Government's policy in this area. There is currently a consultation open by the DfE on the subject of "how to support schools to improve the quality of teaching of personal, social, health and economic (PSHE) education, including giving teachers the flexibility to use their judgement about how best to deliver PSHE education"

We are already seeing a significant threat to quality PSHE provision, given the savage cuts to any non-statutory local authority support services, such as PSHE advisers and those with responsibility for anti-bullying, LGBT, anti-racist and other projects.

We can also be sure that the usual round of homophobic pressure groups will be making submissions to the consultation, often hiding behind a smokescreen of "faith", to attack LGBT equality teaching: indeed certain "faith" based groups are likely to mount wholesale attacks on broad and factual sex education programmes (including pressure to introduces the widely discredited "abstinence only" curricula.)

It is vital that teachers with practical experience of delivering PSHE, SRE and equality programmes in schools make their views known in the consultation, which is open until 30th November.

Click here to take part in the consultation

EEPD: Response to School Governence Regulations

The committee discussed the amendment to the School Governance regulations currently being consulted upon by the Government. This clarifies the position of parents being appointed as foundation governors, and is especially pertinent to voluntary aided church schools.

We agreed that the union would express the view amendment should "not alter fair representation on governing bodies. The stakeholder model of governance, with its roots firmly in democratic accountability, must be maintained and not be threatened by cutting back the size of governing bodies. The number of foundation governors must be retained as they form part of a named group appointed by the school’s founding body, church or other organisations named in the school’s instrument of government." and that

"No group or governing bodies, including foundation governors, should be disenfranchised. There should be no reduction in the required percentage of parent governors nor in the majority of foundation governors in voluntary aided or qualifying foundation schools, or the percentage of foundation governors in voluntary controlled schools."

You can add your view to the DfE consultation by visiting their website here.

EEPD Committee: Gender Advisory Committee Report

The EEPD Committee received the report of the Union's national Gender Advisory Committee. A number of recommendations were made from this committee, and were approved:-

It was agreed that:

• The National Union of Teachers should affiliate to Eaves Housing, and should make a one off donation to reflect the importance of the contribution of Eaves Housing to women and girls experiencing violence and to trafficked women and girls.


• The National Executive carry out research in relation to gender stereotypes as outlined in the research proposals.


• The NUT should submit motions to TUC Women’s Conference on: the issues of the privatisation of the education service and the threat of privatisation to progressive terms and conditions for women workers achieved through collective bargaining; and the issue of women over 50 in the labour market and the impact of sexism and ageism on this group of working women.


• The National Executive consider ways to ensure that all campaign materials and NUT events (including Annual Conference) should reflect the fact that almost 80 per cent of NUT members are women; and that


• The National Executive consider arranging a one-off event with the purpose of increasing the number of women who are active as lay activists.
  

EEPD Committee: Response to Initial Teacher Training Proposals

The EEPD Committee discussed the Government’s Initial Teacher Training (ITT) Strategy Implementation Plan, published this week.

On Tuesday, Christine Blower had said:

"A first class degree does not necessarily a first class teacher make. The real incentive which Government needs to address in order to attract people into teaching is not simply bursaries. Teachers need to be given greater control over what goes on in the classroom, the unnecessary bureaucratic workload needs to go, pay and conditions need to remain competitive and of course Government needs to ensure a good pension.

There is a place for introducing some specialist teachers at primary school level but it cannot be at the expense of all primary teachers having initial and continuing professional development. A small cadre of sponsored first class degree primary specialists is not the way to ensure excellence in the 19,000 primary schools in England.

While it's absolutely right that schools should be involved in both content and delivery of ITT programmes, there is a need to maintain national standards and a syllabus for all trainee teachers. If not there is a danger that teachers will be trained to work in one particular type of school or type of neighbourhood rather than to be equipped to teach across a full range of schools and colleges."

A draft response to the Master Teacher Standard was also debated, and I will publish a link to the final document on this site at a later point."

Pension Negotiations (not very) Special

The BBC reported yesterday on what was billed as concessions in the public sector pensions debate from the Government. The NUT, however, does ot share this excitement, based on the REALITY of what is being proposed:

In discussions with TUC unions including the NUT, the Government has been putting forward a package of proposals for public sector pensions. These would involve teachers:

• paying 50% more – an average 9.6% instead of 6.4%;
• having to work later – with normal pension age linked to State pension age, a teacher aged 34 or under would have to work to age 68 for a full pension
• receiving a “career average” pension based on an annual accrual rate of 1/65 of pay
• Facing lower pension increases in retirement - with the move to the CPI inflation index cutting 15% from the lifetime value of their pension

Yestrday's offer is in 3 parts:

• The accrual rate for pensions would be improved from 1/65 to 1/60.

This would only maintain the current accrual rate for the post-2007 Teachers Pensions Scheme, so it is not an improvement compared with the current scheme. It would still also mean teachers paying more, working longer and getting less due to career averaging and CPI pensions indexation

• Teachers within 10 years of their current normal pension age on 1 April 2012 would have “transitional protection”.

This would apply to those in the pre 2007 TPS born before 1 April 1962 and those in the post 2007 scheme born before 1 April 1957. It would mean that they would remain on their current final salary scheme, with the same accrual rate and normal pension age as now, so that their pension entitlements would be unaffected. The Government has also suggested the possibility of further "tapered" protection. Teachers who get this protection would, however, still have to pay 50% higher contributions and face losses from CPI pension indexation, the biggest changes facing this group. The NUT would welcome this protection but teachers in that group should still want to defend younger teachers facing much bigger attacks.

• The Government would promise that this will be the last change to pensions for a “generation”.

It is not at all clear how the current Government can bind its successors. Also, this does not mean that there would be no further increases in teachers’ normal pension ages. The Government wants to retain the proposed link between the TPS pension age and State pension age. This would mean the TPS pension age rising above 68 if the State pension age was increased further or individual teachers’ pension ages rising if the timetable for the planned increases in State pension age to 67 and 68 was brought forward.

The NUT will now be considering its response to the Government proposals in discussions within the TUC and with other teacher unions. The NUT Executive meets next on 10 November. We remain committed, however, to action on 30 November in conjunction with other unions if the Government does not move further to secure a negotiated agreement.

A Big Thank You

Dear Colleagues-

Some of you may have noticed that this report has not been updated since the start of the new academic year. You may not know that I was off sick for a long period of time at the start of term. I am now back at work, and hope that "normal service" will be resumed.

I would like to thank those colleagues who have given me great support during this time- especially Marian and Nick at the Regional office, and Phil and Sheila in East Sussex.

Dave