National Executive Meeting Report
Strategic Committees met in the morning prior to the full NEC in the afternoon. I sit on the Policy, Research and Campaigns Committee
Committee – Policy, Research and Campaigns
- Discussion on the pay and funding campaign
- Discussion about the recent Supreme Court Judgement and EHRC guidance on trans rights and a motion agreed to go to full Executive
- Discussion on the Teaching Commission headed up by Mary Bousted (Former Joint General Secretary of NEU)
- Discussion on how to launch and use the new union documents on pedagogy, teaching and curriculum
- Discussion and agreement of a motion on Reform and the upcoming Durham Miners’ Gala to go to full Executive
General Secretary’s Report
- The NJC Support staff unions have lodged a complaint with the TUC following the NEU conference and the passing of the support staff motion
- STRB report likely to be accepted by the Government. The Government thinks schools can afford 1.3% pay increase and can make 1% efficiency savings.
- The NEU think that 86% of schools will have to make cuts if the pay offer is not fully funded and those cuts will be the equivalent of 12,000 support staff posts and 10,000 teacher posts
- NEU has told the Government that schools cannot make efficiencies savings but the sector as a whole could if we looked at academisation, outsourcing etc.
- The NEU believes the DfE is trying to find additional funding and the DfE believe we will ballot
- The Executive agreed an amendment to Daniel’s report that calls on the union to recommend members reject any pay offer that is not fully funded and that we aim to ballot in the Autumn term.
NEC Meeting
Membership Report: Membership is fairly static. An email campaign has resulted in 1,600 student members converting to full membership
Financial Report: Variance budget shows a smaller surplus than budgeted but that’s because expenditure is slightly up due to some big ticket items, e.g. annual subscription to Education International
Urgency Reports:
Policy, Research and Campaigns: Motion on the Supreme court ruling on trans rights agreed. Motion on Reform and Durham Miners Gala agreed.
Bargaining and Negotiation: No urgency
Union Strength: No urgency
General Purposes Committee: Agreed membership fee increase of 2.5% for standard members and 1% for support staff members. Agreed donation of £3,000 to Bevan Foundation Project and £10,000 to People’s Assembly National Demonstration on 7th June.
Member Defence: Agreed a change to the wording of the rules for appeal to refuse/withdraw legal assistance. There is no right to appeal, however if a member’s circumstances have significantly changed then the sub-committee may meet to review its decision
International: Agreed donation of £5,000 to Education International appeal for defence of Turkish trade unionists. Agreed donation of £5,000 to Education International appeal for support of Myanmar education activists. Agreed donation of £5,122 to Gambia teachers union and Steve Sinnott Foundation for Level 2 counselling and guidance training programme. Agreed £10,000 donation to Cuba Solidarity Campaign for Cuba Education Conference. Agreed donation of £1,000 to Justice for Columbia towards translation of the memoir of Tanja Nijemeijer
Action Committee
Since the start of January this year, the action committee has authorised 168 indicative ballots and 116 formal ballots. There has been an increase in the number of disputes about restructure and redundancies. Workload disputes remain high as do TPS disputes in independent schools.
email: deborah.gwynn@neu.org.uk