Teachers have threatened to strike over pay despite being handed a bumper increase by the Government in September last year. Delegates of the NASUWT teaching union have warned the Government that any pay reward which is not “fully funded” will be rejected, as they voted to “step up” their campaigning at a conference in Liverpool.
The union is attempting to secure real-terms pay award for teachers next academic year and has called on the union’s committee to “to reject any pay award that is not fully funded and to move immediately to ballot members for industrial action.” This comes after the National Education Union (NEU), threatened to launch a ballot on strike action if the Government did not improve its pay offer to teaches which it branded “unacceptable”. The move threatens to place additional stress on Chancellor Rachel Reeves’ bottom line and has the potential to embarrass the Government for its decision to award teachers with a pay rise just over six months ago.
Last September, teachers in England were given a fully funded 5.5% pay rise after months of strike action which left some schools unable to open fully.
The Department for Education believes that a further pay rise of 2.8% for 2025/26 would be appropriate, but the two sides remain far away from an agreement.
The NASUWT’s decision on Saturday to carry the motion with the threat of strike action called on the government to fund public services to enable the profession to “recruit and retain the staff needed.”
Delegate Dan Lister, junior vice president of the NASUWT, said: “Let the message go out from this conference loud and clear, we will not accept another unfunded or partially funded pay offer.
“We will not settle for empty promises while our colleagues burn out and our students miss out.
“The Government’s recommendation to the STRB for a 2.8 per cent partially funded pay award is not acceptable.”
Patrick Roach, general secretary of the NASUWT, said: “The NASUWT conference has today made it crystal clear that teachers deserve a real terms pay rise and that schools must be provided with the additional funding needed to pay for it.
“We are also clear that if the Government fails to fully fund the next pay award, the NASUWT will be left with no choice but to ballot our members for industrial action.
“We know that the Government has been handed the pay review body’s latest report and we hope that the pay review body has been ambitious in putting forward recommendations that will address the ongoing recruitment and retention crisis.”
Education Secretary, Bridget Phillipson believes that further strike action by teachers would be “indefensible”.
She said: “Following a 5.5 % pay award in a hugely challenging fiscal context, I would urge unions to put children first.”
In a video shown at the conference on Saturday, Ms Phillipson warned of more “difficult decisions” on the horizon due to a tough financial inheritance.
Ms Phillipson added: “Delivering our mission isn’t going to be easy. The toughest financial inheritance in a generation has meant that we’ve already had to take some incredibly difficult decisions, and I’m afraid that more are still coming.”
Teachers in England received a fully funded 5.5% pay rise in September last year.
NEU members staged eight days of strike action in state schools in England in 2023 in a long-running pay dispute.
In July 2023, the Government agreed to implement the STRB’s recommendation of a 6.5% increase for teachers in England, and coordinated strike action by four unions was called off.
The NASUWT teaching union is due to make an announcement next week on the nominations received for its next general secretary.