- Conference
- 2024 Local Government Service Group Conference
- Date
- 1 January 2024
- Decision
- Carried
Conference notes that UNISON is the largest union for school support staff – representing over 250,000 members across the UK.
Conference believes:
1) That the government’s real terms cuts to school funding have led to a crisis in education.
2) That this crisis was starkly demonstrated by the dire warnings from the Department for Education that some school buildings are now at risk of collapse due to them approaching the end of their designed life expectancy, and their structural integrity being impaired.
3) That this funding crisis has also led to a pay crisis in which many dedicated staff can simply no longer afford to work in schools anymore, with UNISON’s Stars in our Schools Survey in November 2023 showing nearly half (46%) were looking for better paid work in sectors such as retail and hospitality. It is clear that schools are now being engulfed by a recruitment and retention crisis.
4) Children with special educational needs are being disproportionately negatively affected by the funding crisis in our schools. These pupils are particularly impacted by a lack of continuity of staff as schools rely increasingly on supply when they cannot recruit or maintain support staff. Schools may also resort to using fewer staff to support greater numbers of pupils with additional needs to cut costs. This is letting the most vulnerable children down and will have an impact on their families and the wider community as a whole.
Conference also reiterates its continued opposition to the privatisation of schools in England through academisation.
Conference further believes:
a) That this crisis is a direct result of the political decisions and austerity policies of successive Tory governments.
b) That we need a government that will urgently invest in, and rebuild, both our school buildings and our schools workforce so as to ensure children are safe and have the highest quality education.
c) That the Labour Party’s commitment to reintroduce the School Support Staff Negotiating Body if it wins the election is an important step and will provide a vehicle for addressing the issues of chronic low pay, and underinvestment in the school support staff workforce.
d) The Government’s minimum service level legislation may impact greatly on support staffs’ ability to protect their pay, terms and conditions by making it illegal for them to take strike action.
School support staff roles have changed considerably, and job descriptions and pay grades no longer reflect the additional responsibility and knowledge required to fulfil them effectively.
Inclusive settings mean more SEN children in each class. With the lack of school funding, the few teaching assistants available must support a number of these children at the same time. Children with more complex needs requiring highly trained and experienced support staff to enable them to access the curriculum and reach their potential.
The aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic means that more young people need support with their mental health and emotional wellbeing. Our school members regularly report a deterioration of classroom behaviour including being on the receiving end of violence and aggression from students.
Teaching Assistants have a starting salary from as little as £11.79 p/h and are mostly on term time only contracts. From April 2024 the National Living Wage will be £11.44 p/h. It is unacceptable that schools support staff are paid so little. Additionally, most support staff are only paid for their classroom time but often spend their unpaid breaks supporting the children and teachers. Many school support staff need to claim Universal Credit and/or use food banks.
Other jobs in the wider marketplace offering similar hourly rates of pay require less knowledge and experience and carry much less responsibility. A coffee shop barista can earn £10.42-£13.02 p/h. A cashier in a supermarket can earn from £10.23 p/h and is likely to receive discounts on their shopping. These contracts are offered on flexible bases by some employers too.
Schools are struggling to recruit new support staff and can’t retain the staff they have. Some schools have rolling adverts for school support staff and cannot fill the vacancies. Instead, they must use agency staff whom are, ironically, paid more than their permanent colleagues.
We know that there are academies that are refusing to recognise trade unions and do not follow NJC terms and conditions. Our members in these schools are often paid less than those members in schools that do follow NJC Pay Scales and have less favourable conditions regarding issues such as sick pay.
We have to make our school members a priority. They occupy the largest share of our membership and we need to fight for better pay for them. School support staff play an integral part in the learning and wellbeing of children and young people in schools. These roles should be valued and remunerated appropriately.
Conference calls upon the Local Government Service Group Executive to:
i) Work with other relevant parts of UNISON seek to ensure the Tory-made school funding crisis is a key part of the union’s general election campaign;
ii) Lobby Government over schools funding – to include amounts specifically ringfenced to increase pay of support staff;
iii) Work with Labour Link to secure a commitment from any future Labour Government to increase school funding to address this crisis;
iv) Campaign for re-evaluation of support staff roles; and the creation of a strategy to ensure academies commit to following NJC terms and conditions for support staff.
v) Produce sample support staff job descriptions for national application;
vi) Specifically raise the issue of the unfairness of term time only (TTO) contracts and to campaign for the introduction of 52-week contracts for all school support staff;
vii) Further develop our campaigning on pay / pay and grading for school support staff, using teaching assistants, as an example of a group whose pay needs urgent attention;
viii) Support branches to organise local re-grading campaigns that can address those support staff such as TA 1’s and 2’s that are relatively under-graded. This will include the production of organising guidance and template campaign materials.
ix) Work with Labour Link to seek to persuade a future Labour Government to end academisation and bring existing academies back under local authority control.
x) Work with Labour Link to ensure a future Labour government repeals the minimum service level legislation.
xi) Working in partnership with the National Schools Committee, National Joint Committee and the Labour Party to achieve these goals.
Dorset (Motion 16)
Bolton Metro (Amendment 16.1)
Local Government Service Group Executive (Motion 17)
Wirral (Amendment 17.1)
York City (Amendment 17.2)