Firstly, Apologies for the delay… as you can imagine due to the HUGE efforts taken by Wirral Members across the district in getting our collective voices heard and represented, collating the story and pictures below has been no mean feat.
Secondly, Thank you…. Thank you to the members who travelled to London. Thank you to the members who stayed home and kept the home fires burning. Thank you to those who spoke to the press. Thank you to those who kept their own stances of solidarity. Thank you to the Picketers. Thank you to the officers who supported them. Thank you to the people who made the Signs and Placards. Thank you to the people who made the cups of Tea.
We do not say it lightly….We have never been prouder to be Wirral NEU
Day Three
Local Events
As has become a staple across the Wirral the number and strength of our local pickets had continue to grow. Despite many travelling members (more on them below), we still had a huge turn out locally. Following the pickets we met in the Sea Horse in New Brighton to share our picket stories and generally catch up.
London
To make sure we fully represented the members back home we made sure that Wirral NEU was in the thick of the national Rally.
We started our day with a clear message to Gillian Keegan from our train carriages that we were coming to London to request a fully funded wage increase
Once we had arrived in London, many of us made our way straight to the front of the March. On the way we received tremendous support from locals with lots of Beeping and messages of support from passers by. We also managed to get the opportunity to serenade a group of Junior Doctors picketing on the Euston Road.
Once at speakers corner we were quickly ushered by to the front of the March were many of our members held the banner with our National President Louise Atkinson. Neil Sledge our local president quickly unfurled our Wirral banner making sure it was pride of place for many photos. Being at the front many of us had the opportunity to speak to Union leaders such as Kevin Courtney, Dr Mary Bousted, Niamh Sweeney and Daniel Kebede. We also managed to garner lots of press coverage for members being interviewed by JOE, BBC, LBC and Sky News!
We sang and chanted our way from Speakers Corner to Trafalgar Square where we managed to score another front row seat with members and our banner featured on News Night and in the Evening Standard.
We heard from fantastic speakers including local girl Emma Runswick who was a pupil at St. Georges on Wirral and is now Deputy Council Chair at the BMA. Mary and Kevin gave the rallying cry of the importance of standing up for education and the children in our charge as we again heard the fantastic poem from the Manchester Rally which brought many tears to many eyes.
We returned exhausted to the train knowing that we had done our upmost best in representing members back home!
Best Of Twitter
In the Press
BBC Live Coverage (Interview with Local Member Declan) – As it happened: Teachers, doctors and Tube staff walk out in biggest strike day – BBC News
JOE (Interview with local Member Michelle 2mins 27s) – Unreported: Thousands of teachers march through London in historic protest – YouTube
BBC News Night –
Evening Standard – Government and education unions agree to ‘intensive talks’ on teacher pay | Evening Standard
National Education Union –
https://www.facebook.com/plugins/post.php?href=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.facebook.com%2Fnationaleducationunion%2Fposts%2Fpfbid0hpFRgBrjhVvpVzRgUTJtvtg26CoM9cKDAy278GQ4QZB5jtKJTrbeswTUdj1XTJgZl&show_text=true&width=500Day Four
Amazingly despite the efforts put in on Wednesday, by 6am Thursday Morning Members were ready to go again. With More Pickets and a sit and down coffee and chat following members had a great opportunity to sit, reflect and share their stories from the last four days. We were recognised for all our hard work with shout outs from Dr Mary and the Regional Office
A thought…
At time of writing the Government has sat down to intensive negotiations with our Union leaders. That is down to all of you. Before the prospect, threat and implementation of strike action there were no talks, no plans of talks, no prospect of talks. All of you have brought the Government to the table. We should be proud of ourselves for what is a great achievement. We all hope this will be a time for calm and compromise for the Government. We do not want to disrupt schools but we must stand up for ourselves, our colleagues and our children. We hope not to strike again, but we know if we do, we are strong, we are together, we will fight and we will win!