ChrisBlakey Blog

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Go to this link in order to sign the petition to show your opposition to the plans to turn Oxford school into an academy:

http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/SaveOxfordSchool?e

From September 2009 the school teachers contract says that teachers will only cover rarely. In practice this means NO COVER. This is an important and long overdue victory for a longstanding demand. Older teachers in London will remember the ILTA no cover campaigns of the 80s and 90s.
To meet the new terms of the contract schools should be planning that teachers will NEVER NORMALLY be called on to cover. Only in TRULY EXCEPTIONAL circumstances should teachers be asked to cover. This will mean that non contact time can be used much more effectively as teachers will be able to count on getting it and plan how they use it.
THIS IS A NEW CONTRACTUAL RIGHT – it is not an optional extra that heads can choose to implement or not.
LACK OF FINANCE IS NOT AN ALLOWED REASON FOR NOT IMPLEMENTING RARELY COVER – Just as schools aren’t allowed not to implement a national pay rise pay rise nor suggest cutting pay to balance the books, schools can not refuse to implement NO COVER for financial reasons. The NUT will support schools in demanding extra funding – but we must insist that the contract is fully implemented.
NO CUTS TO NON-CONTACT TIME – Schools are not allowed to cut non –contact time in order to finance ‘rarely cover’. Non-contact time (as PPA) is guaranteed to be at least 10%. But wherever non-contact time is more than that it is protected by a NO DETRIMENT clause in the School Teachers Pay and Conditions document.
NO COVER FOR BELOW ‘NORMAL’ LOADING TEACHERS - Some heads are suggesting that teachers who have ‘extra’ non contact time can be asked to cover during those extra periods. This is also against the contract; the only teachers who can be asked to cover more than rarely are those employed “wholly” or “mainly “ to do cover i.e. supply teachers.
NO ANNUAL NUMBER OF COVERS – There should be no new number of annual covers –no matter how small –e.g. no 10 covers per year or 6 covers per year. Schools should be planning never to ask teachers to cover – it should be a truly exceptional matter to be asked to cover.
ACTION TO ENFORCE THE CONTRACT – The NUT will back members to enforce this contract through industrial action and through ‘compliance’ orders. If there is any problem in your school get in touch with us a.s.a.p.
WHO SHOULD DO THE COVER THEN? – The NUT believes that Local Authorities should work with schools to establish local supply pools – cutting out the rip-off of the agency middlemen. These supply teachers could be in the pension scheme and be working in the same schools regularly – so that children know them and so that they know the pastoral staff etc.
WHAT ABOUT COVER SUPERVISORS? – The NUT believes that students whose teacher is away should be taught – not just minded. Never the less the Government has allowed schools to employ ‘cover supervisors’ to do ‘short term’ cover work.
The Government doesn’t define what short –term is and the NUT has heard of cases where cover supervisors have been used for known in advance paternity leaves and even suggestions of them being used for maternity leaves.
The NUT wants supply teachers used for every cover. But if cover supervisors are used we say they the MAXIMUM time that they should ever be used for is the first three days of a cover. We are putting this limit forward because the Government and its partners are not suggesting one. It is the same as the old limit for short-term cover after which supply teachers were always brought in.
In many situations three days would far too long – and for some groups cover supervisors should never be used.
WHAT IF COVER SUPERVISORS ARE BEING MISUSED? – If cover supervisors are being used in ways in which NUT members believe they are damaging children’s educational opportunities – or if they are being used to ‘teach’ instead of ‘cover’ it is very important that NUT members get in touch straight away. Not only would such misuse damage education opportunities for children, but it would also undermine the pay and conditions of qualified teachers.
We maintain good relations with the unions that represent cover supervisors and they have many concerns about the misuse and exploitation of cover supervisors and would work with them to get limits enforced. Parents would also be very concerned about their children losing out on having qualified teachers in the classroom.

Below is the text of the no cover motion agreed at Conference.

No cover and a qualified teacher in every classroom. Ammended Motion 35.

Conference reaffirms its belief that ‘every class deserves a teacher’, and condemns the acceptance by the government and other trade unions that it is acceptable for non-teacher qualified staff to teach classes, and in particular for absent teachers to be replaced by cover supervisors or HLTAs.
Conference notes that statutory provisions do not allow CS to carry out ‘specified work’ which is the work of teachers, and allow HLTAs to do this only in order to assist and under the direction and supervision of a teacher.
Conference further believes that this has harmed the quality of education offered to our students.
Conference welcomes the government’s commitment that teachers should rarely cover from 1 September 2009. However, conference notes the failure of the so-called ‘social partnership’ between government and some trade unions to deliver a reduction in teacher workload, and notes that teachers’ workload continues to rise. Conference further notes that this is the consequence of relentless pressure to meet externally imposed targets, excessive testing and large class sizes, and reaffirm our willingness to take national and local action up to and including strike action, to improve our circumstances, and those of our students.
Conference further notes that:
1. The privatisation of the supply teacher system has significantly raised the cost of employing supply teachers, and notes that supply teachers, many of whom are our members, are suffering a significant loss of livelihood as a result.
2. Since the government allowed the employment of Cover supervisors from Sept 2003, to ‘cover’ classes, and of HLTAs to do ‘specified work’ to assist a teacher and under the direction of a teacher, their employment has increased very significantly and that they are widely employed in every area of England and Wales. In many cases they are employed on a casual basis and on low wages, with little or no career progression.
3. The Workforce Agreement Monitoring Group’s (WAMG) guidance relating to the employment of CS lays down very few requirements and only makes suggestions about best practice, which are at the discretion of the Head teacher. Furthermore the WAMG guidance on the employment of HLTAs published in Oct 2008 acknowledges concerns about the inappropriate use of unqualified staff to deliver classes.
4. Conference also notes that HLTAs are being deployed in the place of a qualified teacher despite the statutory provisions restricting HLTAs to carrying out ‘specified work’ only in order to assist or support the work of a teacher and subject to and under the direction and supervision of a teacher.
Conference instructs the Executive to:
a. Campaign among teachers, relevant student groups and parents for every class to be taught by a properly qualified teacher.
b. Campaign for the establishment of supply pools of properly qualified supply teachers who are able to teach and develop relationships with students, are employed on national teachers pay and conditions and have access to the Teachers’ pension Scheme and CPD and to promote this with head teachers and head teacher organisations.
c. Support Divisions and Associations in ensuring that in primary schools, the new cover arrangements are also applied to the system of ‘split classes.’
d. Support Divisions and Associations in ensuring that teaching assistants are supporting the students they are assigned to, and that they are not pushed, against their will, into covering lessons, with a subsequent deterioration in the quality of education in the school.
Where it has not been possible to ensure our position that absent teachers should always be covered by supply teachers Conference resolves to work with other education unions both locally and nationally, in particular UNISON and the GMB who represent many CS, to ensure that:
(i) where CS or HLTAs are used they receive proper conditions of employment, pay and career prospects and training appropriate to their role;
(ii) CS are not used to do specified work, such as PPA, and are used for no more that the first 3 days of absence in secondary schools and no more than the first day of absence in primary schools; and
(iii) Where HLTAs are used they carry out ‘specified work’ only to assist and under the supervision of a teacher.

Below is a list of the main policies adopted at Conference over the Easter weekend.
• Major campaign on SATs, building to a boycott
• Mobilisation for UNITE demonstration on May 16th
• Discussion on a demonstration in the autumn term on youth unemployment
• Endorsing the People’s Charter as the basis for discussion
• Arguing for cover to be done by qualified supply teachers
• Campaign for the establishment of supply pools
• Ensuring limits on the use of cover supervisors
• National action on pay, workload and class size
• Campaign to defend public services
• Promote a boycott of settlement goods
• A national conference on Trust schools
• A campaigning website on child poverty
• A major billboard campaign before the general election
• Organise non-compliance with the 15 hour entitlement in nursery settings
• Establish a new Black members structure
• Strike action against cuts in sixth form spending
• Development of an Education Charter
• Encourage campaigning against the BNP in the June elections
• Reinvigorate the campaign for the abolition of Ofsted

Class Struggles in France ...the temperature is rising !!

Oxford 01/04/09

Outline of talk:
Economic indicators.
Response of workers.
Response of unions.
Revolutionary left …NPA
Prospects.

Economic indicators.

• Share prices fallen by 45% in last 12 months. GDP by 3%.
• Unemployment up by 19% to 2.5 million [3.24mil if part time & temporary contracts included.]
• Sectors hardest hit: construction, steel, car chemical industries.
• Least hard hit: agriculture, service industries related to care of young and elderly, but President Sarkozy has made clear that the public sector will not be immune from cutbacks, job cuts announced in health and particularly education sectors. Other sectors so far not so badly affected are nuclear and renewable energy industries and “quelle surprise” there has been significant growth in the ‘security’ sectors especially related to public surveillance and means to spy on workers in their workplaces. Despite the onset of ‘deflation,’ other than for energy bills prices have not fallen and inflation has gone up by 1% overall. This does mask however continued significant price rises in the costs of transport, communications, rents [+ 2,8%] council services [2.7%] and food prices [ + 2.2%].
• Wages: minimum wage [SMIC] since July 2008 = approx £1200 per month ie just under £8.00/hour [full time 35 hrs/week] but 7 million French workers survive on only £800 / month [part time workers etc] Average workers wage is in fact approx £14,000 / year or £1160 /month ie less than SMIC.
• With the recession just like here workers are being forced to accept cuts in hours, wages or both.
• The average boss on the other hand has had to survive on a wage of just E60,000 per year [approx £58,000]!! Hard times for some! Just as in the UK the bankers and bosses in the largest industries have received rescue packages, bail outs and continued to receive their bonuses. But as a result of mass anger Sarkozy has had to publicly call for bosses to forgo ‘stock options’ and indeed in industries financed in any way by the State, bonuses have been cancelled.

Response of workers.

• Mass anger and an unwillingness to pay for the financial crisis of capitalism.
• A crisis that most French people, according to the opinion polls, see as being created by the bosses and capitalists themselves.
• This has expressed itself in some original and direct ways that we are yet to see in the UK
1. e.g. Supermarket Picnics in order to protest at the rising cost of food. Groups of protestors occupy of supermarket aisles by installing picnic chairs and tables and then without paying have a sample taste of the foods on offer in the supermarket!! Most leave within 20 minutes and continue the picnic outside the main entrance to the supermarket. Have received great support from the public in the shops.
2. Workers have ‘obliged’ bosses to march with workers on demonstrations against job cuts.
3. Bosses hjave been kept in their offices for periods of up to 48 hours until workers demands are met. Examples recently at a Caterpillar factory in Grenoble 31/03/09. Sony France in the Landes department and 3M at Pithiviers south of Paris earlier in March . All received widespread publicity in the media.

• Such direct action by workers [usually with full support of local unions] has increased significantly over the last few weeks. Articles in the press [le Monde] fully expect such actions to multiply even more over the coming period.
• According to Le Monde yesterday (01/04/09) 6/10 French people support such actions and are urging trade unions to further organize a fightback.
• Sarkozy’s election campaign slogan was “Work more to earn more” [i.e ‘liberalise overtime and get rid of 35hr max]. Now people are saying that what he really meant is “Work more to earn less!” His population rating is at an all time low. Is this why he is using Keynesian ‘left’ rhetoric about regulation of banks and business?

Response of unions.
• Two general strikes 29 Jan & 19 March.
• Mostly in the public sector where unions are relatively strong + increasingly strikes are also happening in the private sector.
• 19th March 2,5-3 million workers striking and on the streets. It took 5hrs to walk from from the start to the finish of the Paris demo!
• Another general strike planned for 1st May. For the first time ever we have had a united call from all 8 Union confederations. Slogans: No job cuts / E300 increase for all /increase SMIC / price reductions/ end to tax breaks and bonuses for bosses.
• Mobilise for and carry out protests, actions during April. Have already seen many more short strikes (less than 48 hours) and go slows.

Revolutionary left …Nouveau Parti Anticapitalist
• Welcome the strike call but it is not enough.
• (NPA 10,000 members. A national opinion poll in Feb showed Besancenot to be most popular politician in France!)
• NPA are arguing for a continuous general strike until demands are met. [As happened in Guadaloupe in Jan & Feb for 44 days> main demand of E200 wage increase for all + 170 other demands were met in full]
• No need to wait until 1st May [opinion poll shows 22% would support this.] Use the unity to build actions now.

Prospects.
• Unity & strikes
• Sarkozy dropping in popularity.
• PS in pieces
• CP aging but still has influence in unions but looking to regain popularity. Some sections prepared to work with NPA.
• Other left such as LO still sectarian cannot relate to social movements.
• NPA continuing to grow and seen as the real left opposition….but needs to still clarify, revolutionary, united front, anti-capitalist??