GOVERNMENT PAY OFFER: VOTE TO REJECT NOW

Your resolve to do what’s right for our profession and the children we teach forced the Government to the negotiating table.

Without your strike action, it would not have made the pay offer that we will outline below.

Sadly, the Government’s new offer falls well short of what your elected national executive believes is acceptable.

Put simply, it’s just not good enough.

It is not fully funded. It would mean that teachers in England fall even further behind their counterparts in Wales and Scotland. It would represent another two years of real terms pay cuts. And it would do nothing to ease the recruitment and retention crisis plaguing education.

For all these reasons, we are asking you to reject this offer in our consultative ballot and demand the Government do better.

Please take the time to read the information below, then click on the link we have sent you by text and email to cast your vote. Our consultative ballot will close at 3pm on Sunday, 2 April.

Why reject?

The offer is not fully funded.

We have crunched the numbers and, contrary to Government claims, we calculate that between 42 per cent and 58 per cent of schools will need to make further cuts to provision or staffing to pay for the rises it has offered, depending on how much energy costs increase.

Schools have already cut staffing and provision to the bone. We cannot accept that they make further cuts.

The offer will leave teachers in England even further behind colleagues in Wales and Scotland.

It would mean that, next year, a teacher in England with six years’ experience would be earning £1,985 less per annum than their counterpart in Wales and a staggering £8,037 less per annum than Scottish colleagues.

This is simply unfair. And it is a political decision taken by the Westminster Government, leaving teachers and pupils in England short-changed.

The offer means another two years of real terms pay cuts on top of the losses you’ve suffered since 2010.

The Government’s pay award for 2022 amounted to 5 per cent for most teachers from September, when inflation was 12.6 per cent – that’s a 7.6 per cent real-terms pay cut. The Government’s offer for 2022 is an additional one-off £1,000 cash payment that would not even be consolidated into your pay next year and is dwarfed by the average household energy bill alone (currently £2,500 a year).

The Government’s pay offer for 2023 amounts to just 4.3 per cent for most teachers from September, when inflation is projected to be 8.1 per cent – that’s another 3.8 per cent real-terms pay cut, leaving many teachers still struggling to make ends meet.

For all these reasons, we recommend you vote to reject now.

You can read the Government offer in full here.

This offer won’t stem the exodus of teachers from the profession or ensure pupils are taught by those qualified in the subjects they are teaching.

We need the biggest turnout possible, so please make sure you have your say before the ballot closes at 3pm on Sunday, 2 April.

If you vote to reject this offer, the executive has agreed to notify two further days of strike action on Thursday, 27 April and Tuesday, 2 May.

If the offer is accepted, the National Education Union (NEU) will settle our dispute and continue discussions on measures to reduce workload.

Summary of the Government’s offer:

• An extra £1,000 non-consolidated pro-rata cash payment to all teachers and leaders for 2022/23, equivalent to an additional 2.4 per cent on top of the average September 2022 pay award.

A non-consolidated cash payment means that the extra won’t be included in your baseline pay for next year. In Wales, their pay deal provides an additional 3 per cent on top of their September 2022 pay award, half of which is fully consolidated into their baseline pay for next year. And this year’s 7 per cent pay rise in Scotland is fully consolidated. That means it’s included in next year’s pay as well as this.

• A 4.5 per cent pay envelope for teachers and leaders pay in 2023/24, equivalent to an increase of 4.3 per cent for experienced teachers.

Inflation was 12.6 per cent this September and is forecast to be 8.1 per cent next September. It amounts to yet another cut in real terms pay. Also, this offer lags behind both Wales and Scotland – Wales teachers will receive a fully consolidated 5 per cent rise next September, whilst Scotland teachers will receive further consolidated pay rises of 5 per cent in April and 2 per cent in January 2024.

• The removal of the statutory requirement for schools to use performance related pay.

The Government refused to discuss our proposal that annual progression through the pay spine should be automatic for teachers, not based on capability. It also refused to discuss re-inserting pay points into the School Teachers’ Pay and Conditions Document, barriers to progression at the threshold and pay portability.

• A series of non-pay measures to support teachers and leaders in schools, including a commitment to reduce average teachers working time by five hours per week.

We know that measures to reduce workload are empty promises without adequate staffing or funding, or without a serious review of the role played by Ofsted. And the Government refused to discuss union proposals for a joint study into the unintended effects of the inspection regime on workload and wellbeing.