School workers forced back to work by lack of proper maternity pay

Brent school strikers on the picket lines in 2024

The lack of proper maternity pay is forcing West London school workers back to work early.

It’s forcing them to leave very young babies in childcare—and pump breast milk in school toilets and car parks.

These are the shocking revelations of a survey of NEU union members in Brent, West London. 

Some 87 percent of those who responded said they want to take industrial action to improve maternity rights. And some 70 percent said they felt pressured to return to work before they were ready.

Lucy Cox, NEU Brent joint district secretary, told Socialist Worker, “People are coming back and being separated from their babies. You have just given birth and suddenly have to leave the baby to work 12 hour days—it isn’t unusual at all to do 12 hours at work.”

Members describe crying in the toilet cubicles during lunch time.

Lucy argued that HR at the council “don’t have any concept about it being emotionally draining”. And the education system is plagued by issues with recruiting and retaining workers—terrible maternity pay only makes this worse.

“Women now have babies later than in the past. By the time you are in your 30s you are an experienced classroom teacher with other responsibilities in the school. You are not being encouraged by these policies to stay in education to come back after having a baby,” she said.

At least eight other London boroughs pay better occupational maternity pay to their school workers than Brent council.

In Haringey, north London, a borough with a similar demographic to Brent, teachers get 14 weeks of full maternity pay. In Brent, it is four weeks of full pay before it starts to decrease.

Yet school workers cannot easily return early after childbirth or while breastfeeding.

The high levels of stress in education, the fast pace, the lack of breaks and the lack of facilities for breastfeeding, on-site creches or even fridges for milk are all barriers.

Despite this, Brent council bosses have informed headteachers that they may stop workers’ occupational maternity pay if they opt to take the “shared parental leave” facility. This allow workers to split maternity leave into separate blocks.

If Brent council fails to improve maternity pay, it will only become harder to recruit new education workers.

Lucy said, “A lot of male colleagues are unhappy about it in relation to their colleagues and their partners. Many said they want to take action.

“If there is no movement from the council we will definitely look towards strikes. This issue has such a profound impact on parents and their young children.”

Lucy spoke about being inspired by the Dunraven Education Trust dispute last year. Here education workers won their fight for better maternity pay after going on strike.

As Lucy said, “It is extremely difficult to do the regular parts of parenting when you are teaching and the sharpest end of that is when a child is newborn and being forced back to work before they are old enough.

“It is hard to give everything to other kids at school when you are worried about your own not having milk or being fed properly.”