Education workers across Midlands strike decisive victory

Strikers rallied outside the Department for Education earlier this week (Picture: Guy Smallman)

Education workers across the Midlands have won a monumental victory.

Strikers at the Arthur Terry Learning Partnership, an academy trust that controls 24 schools across the region, won all their demands.

The result has been a mass resignation of the management.

The CEO, chief financial officer, chair of the trust, vice chair of the trust and chair of the finance committee have all resigned.

NEU union members have won their demands for academy bosses to remove the threat of 100 compulsory redundancies. These redundancies were set to devastate the schools and the quality of education that workers could provide.

The cuts were set to happen due to bosses’ financial mismanagement combined with a huge central spend.

This is the portion of a school’s funds that is siphoned off to the trust to fund its bureaucracy.

At ATLP, the top slice was 29 percent, when on average it is around 5 percent. But strikers have forced management to commit to restructuring the trust’s central spend.

Chris Denson, NEU national executive member, told Socialist Worker that “a new interim CEO has looked at the central spend and sees massive excess”. “They want to work with us to cut it. The top slice is going to come down hugely,” he said. 

“As well as saving members’ jobs, it will put more money back into the schools.”

Chris added that “the top slices of education, health and care plans (EHCPs) have also stopped”.

These are legally binding plans that detail the provision that a child with special educational needs and disabilities (Send) requires and comes with an amount of money.

Previously, management had been taking a portion of the money from the EHCP, meaning less money was going towards Send children.

“As well as winning for us, we have won for the kids.”

NEU members have also stopped the removal of teaching and learning responsibilities payments—additional payments for the extra responsibilities that workers take on.

And they have stopped members having their salaries regraded downwards.

It doesn’t end there. Strikers have also prevented bosses’ attempts to change some workers pay from all year round to term time only, which would have resulted in a huge pay cut.

Management has agreed to have weekly meetings with NEU union representatives and to set up a joint negotiation and consultation committee. This means managers will have to meet regularly with representatives of trade unions to discuss policies and procedures in the school.

There are also talks about union representatives having seats on the board. And bosses have agreed on a three months extension to the strike ballot mandate, meaning that NEU members can make sure there is no slippage on their demands.

Throughout the dispute, the NEU hugely gained in strength, seeing its union membership and the number of union reps in the schools soar upwards. The strike leaves the union in a fighting position for the future.

As Chris said, “Considering the scale of the attacks, the scale of the financial mess they got us into, to have a complete victory and a complete 180 turn from the employer is enormous.”

To go from bosses threatening “100 compulsory redundancies and putting the word out that the NEU can’t make a difference, to winning, is unprecedented,” Chris said.

“This has to be the start not the finish. We have to build on the power throughout the schools. Whether it is workload, curriculum, pedagogy, we have to be a part of those discussions and decisions.

“We will hold the employer’s feet to the fire to make sure they deliver. As soon as there is any slippage we will go back out.”