Concerning the Workers’ Movement and Education

At the 146th Annual Trades Union Congress held from September 7-10 this year, two composite motions were passed concerning education. This was set within the context of what the delegates identified as the appalling squeeze on living standards throughout Britain which “shows no sign of abating” and noted that the apparent economic growth has brought no relief to the vast majority of workers. Congress also deplored the increasing use of privatisation and casualisation as a further means of restricting pay, allowing some employers to circumvent minimum wage law.

The two composite motions concerning education were entitled, “Maintaining a world class education system” (C10: Motions 31 and amendment, 32 and amendment, and motion 34) and “Restoring democratic accountability in the school system” (C11: Motions 33 and 35).

These two composites reflect the preoccupations of the unions in trying to grapple with what amounts to an assault both on the educational provision for young people in Britain as well as on the working conditions of teachers and all those who work within the education sector. It also highlights the necessity of guaranteeing education as a right for all.

The first composite focused on what has been achieved and built in terms of educational standards in Britain, and it condemned what it described as “the ideologically driven denigration of public education and the unremitting assault on the professionalism, pay, working conditions and jobs of teachers and support staff in schools, which”, it said, “are damaging to children’s educational progress and achievements”, and that “
Student march, London, November 19 government attacks on pay and conditions of school staff are an attack on education”.

Supporting this idea, it notes that “teacher working hours have gone up by over 10 per cent since 2010 and these extra hours are not spent on tasks that support students or improve teaching and learning”.

The Composite 10 then went on to congratulate “those unions campaigning to reclaim the promise of public education by ensuring that quality educational opportunities are accessible to all children and young people”. It praised the School Teachers’ Review Body (STRB) for successfully challenging then education secretary Michael Gove’s proposals, and noted that his approval rating amongst the public was somewhere between 9 per cent and 16 per cent.

The composite also focused on music education and the increasing cuts to funding. It reported that the Musicians’ Union and the Music Industries Association (MIA) have launched a new campaign “to help support the invaluable work carried out by music teachers around the UK”. Music teachers, it said, are particularly being affected by job cuts, by a worsening in terms and conditions, and by the casualisation of the workforce, and that it highlighted the “increasing fragmentation of the education system”. It is somewhat ironic that Nicky Morgan, who replaced Gove as Education Secretary, has now raised anger and opposition through her grossly philistine statement that choosing to study arts subjects at school could hold young people “back for the rest of their lives”.

Composite 10 welcomed and supported the five demands of the NUT’s Stand Up for Education campaign, as well as commending “the positive vision set out in ATL’s Shape Education manifesto”, which it said “puts students’ futures before profit, school collaboration before competition, and properly funds the transition from schools and colleges to work with excellent careers guidance”.

The composite concluded with fifteen resolutions to support the various education unions’ campaigns, to expose the ill effects of government education policy, to secure national pay and conditions of service for all teachers and support staff in all state-funded schools, to properly fund schools and colleges, and importantly, to “make education a key strand of TUC campaigning up to the general election 2015” by “setting out to all political parties an alternative education vision”.

The second composite motion focused on the need to restore “Democratic accountability in the school system”. It dealt with the Coalition government’s academies/free schools programme and its concomitant attacks on local government responsibilities and funding which, it said, are causing huge problems of democratic accountability in the education service. The motion accused the government of carrying out secret practices “in promoting unnecessary free schools and unregulated academies”, which it said “amounts to a gross misuse of public funds” and takes away from the public funding of schools. It also criticised the “escalating number of fraud, nepotism and corruption investigations associated with academies and free schools”. It reported that the Secretary of State had taken £400m from the basic needs budget to fill a hole in the free schools’ budget when statistics showed “a rapidly rising primary school population, and a rising number of infant schoolchildren in classes of over 30”. In broad terms, the motion criticised the flagrant profiteering that is being carried out on state education. It also asserted, “Local authorities are best placed to ensure fair access to education for students and support schools in times of crisis, being close at hand and familiar with local contexts, but must be permitted the resources needed to maintain and deploy the necessary support and expertise.”

TUC Congress, 2014To redress these wrongs, the composite called for a “Public Accounts Committee” to be formed that could provide “a fit-and-proper persons test for academy trustees”, whilst demanding “a transparent and equitable funding system for all state-funded schools regardless of status, administered by a democratically accountable middle tier responsive to local needs”. It reiterated, “Funding for public services must not be for private gain.” This “middle tier” was put forward by the motion as a necessary measure that would sit “between government and schools, for oversight of the education system” and for restoring decision making to local authorities.

Composite 11 concluded by calling on the political parties “to commit themselves to a middle-tier based on democratically elected local authorities, holding requisite powers over school place planning and admissions, funded adequately for their role in providing monitoring, support and intervention, and with a strong commitment to a community cohesion”. The motion was moved by the Association of Teachers and Lecturers (ATL).

These composite motions underline the grievous situation that teachers and other workers within education are not involved in the running of their schools, or in the forming of curricula, exams, of setting standards, or indeed, in the determination of wage structures. In short, what is needed is that those who are engaged in the provision of education should be a central part of the decision-making process in all aspects which affect their lives, based on the outlook of providing the education to the younger generation which will fit them to take up the responsibility for the future of society.

Thousands of students marched through London on Wednesday, November 19, to demand full publicly-funded education across Britain. Prominent also amongst the demands was an end to the austerity agenda, which is impacting higher education as well as all the other social programmes in society.

Organisers said that the march was just the beginning of “a major wave of action” ahead of next year’s May general election.

“We are determined,” the students said in a joint letter to the Guardian on the morning of the demonstration, “to build a movement too big to ignore that puts free, accessible and public education back on the political agenda.”

Led by a coalition of several student-led groups – including the Student Assembly Against Austerity, the National Campaign Against Fees and Cuts and the Young Greens –organisers and participants wrote in their open letter:

“Today we are stepping up our campaign against tuition fees and education cuts with the biggest student national demonstration for years. As student debt soars and staff working conditions deteriorate, it is clear that the marketisation of education is failing students and workers alike.

“Last month Germany scrapped tuition fees – proving once again that free education is possible. If the government increased tax on the rich, scrapped Trident or reduced military spending, billions of pounds would be made available to fund education and other vital public services.

“Free education is not just about the money. It’s about the working conditions of those who make our education possible, and about democratising and liberating our institutions and the curriculum; funding vocational and further education, living grants and childcare that allows women to freely access learning.”

In a tweet, the anti-austerity group UK Uncut declared, “No cuts! No fees! No debt! Education is a right not a privilege. The students are back on the streets demanding #Free Education.”

The Young Greens, including the Scottish Young Greens, issued a statement saying that the march will launch the ongoing fight to change the narrative on education in Britain. The statement declared: Education should be a right, not a privilege; There is an alternative; Education is an investment not a cost. The statement pointed out that the government has its priorities wrong. “It sees public services as a means to make a profit for the rich and powerful rather than a means to serve the common good.” The Young Greens set forward the alternative as:

• Abolish all tuition fees.
• Increase student grants to cover costs of living.
• Cut accommodation costs by investing in decent, affordable social housing and regulating landlords.
• Ensure that universities are sufficiently funded and accessible to all, including providing for disabled students and those with children.

Earlier this the year, the Student Assembly Against Austerity released a digital pamphlet, titled The Student Manifesto which explained why free education was necessary and laid out 15 demands to create a revitalised public education in the country. Read or download it here: http://issuu.com/studentassemblyagainstausterity/docs/student_manifesto?e=5654257/10216177

(Common Dreams; Young Greens)

Jaguar Land Rover workers, in a consultative ballot, practically unanimously rejected JLR’s pay “offer”, which the car maker sought to impose on the workforce. Of the 12,881 workers across JLR’s five plants, 96 per cent voted to reject the offer on an almost one-hundred percent turnout. This includes staff and shop-floor together, making it one of the most overwhelming results in industrial history. JLR became part of the Tata Motors Indian car-making monopoly in 2008.

Arousing particular opposition was the company’s proposal to take £240 million off the pension fund, which is seen as a way of funding its pay offer. JLR is proposing to dilute and change the final salary pension scheme, despite its being agreed in negotiations two years ago.

Commenting, Unite national officer Roger Maddison said: “The workforce made huge sacrifices and endured pay freezes during difficult times to ensure that Jaguar Land Rover is the success it is today.

“Their hard work, skills and commitment have helped ensure that JLR has become a highly profitable world leader with a bulging order book. With the company making a staggering £10 million profit a day, it is no surprise that the workforce is angered by pension cuts and a pay offer that falls short in recognising their role in that success.

“JLR needs to get back around the negotiating table and hammer out a deal that meets the workforce’s expectations and shares the rewards of the company’s success fairly. Otherwise we will be looking to ballot our members for industrial action across the company’s five sites.”

Showing his true colours, Vince Cable, the Business Secretary, told the Financial Times last month that the “last thing” Britain needed was to see a revival of union militancy.

The JLR workers are also opposed to the proposed use of one-off bonuses which are not linked to the rate of pay, nor would they be linked to increases in the pension. The workers point out the car-makers’ aim to gradually replace pay rises that attract company pension payments over the coming years with bonuses which will neither be consolidated nor pensionable. Even mooted by the monopoly is that the bonuses should be the same throughout its global operations, and how much that would be worth is an open question. The workers had also wanted new starters to receive 100% of the rate for the job after five years, but the company refused, sticking to its plans for six years. The monopoly also proposed to impose shift and weekend working.

JLR made a record-breaking pre-tax profit of £942m even according to figures in its most recent quarterly results, not far off the £1.3bn Tata paid Ford for the Jaguar and Land Rover brands in 2008. Last year’s profits stood at £2.5 billion, according to its own capital-centred accounting.

The attempt to impose a pay structure and refusing to enter into meaningful negotiations is thus a calculated insult to the JLR workers and their union representatives. The management has refused to accede to a single demand from the workers’ representatives. Full time officials of the union are due to meet management next Thursday, and if the JLR refuses to negotiate, then Unite will look for an industrial ballot.

It is clear that the euphoria that the government and JLR have attempted to generate over the benefit of its productive capacity for the workers, the community and for the economy as a whole was meant to cover over the narrow aims of Tata Motors in maximising its profits in the shortest possible time at the expense of the workforce, who have produced the added value which the company parades as profit. It is also understood that the company may at a whim up sticks and decide to move production to China or India if that suits the owners of its monopoly capital.

The situation at JLR underlines the necessity not only for workers to take a stand against being treated as a cost of production and a refusal by the monopoly to recognise the role of the workers in generating the added value which it appropriates. It also emphasises the necessity for the Workers’ Opposition to challenge the direction which the owners of monopoly capital are taking the economy. The issue facing society is not some “revival of union militancy”. It is that the private ownership of the means of production and the exclusion of the working class from decision-making is causing havoc and dysfunction in the economy and in society as a whole.

Following a 24-hour strike on October 8, the GMB has called for a further two 24-hour strikes on November 24 and 25, of its members working for private contractor ISS at Queen Elizabeth Hospital, Woolwich, over the two-tier workforce being created within the NHS. Over 240 GMB members working for ISS, who provide the security, portering, switchboard, meals and cleaning at the hospital, took part in the 24-hour strike on October 8.

ISS, which employs approximately 47,200 throughout Britain, pays the workers at the QEH, Woolwich, between £7.10 and £7.32 per hour, where the lowest rate of pay for staff directly employed by the NHS is £7.33 per hour. This base minimum will rise in yearly increments to £7.51 and then £7.69, under the current NHS pay progression system. Further, ISS staff who work unsocial hours get as little as between 90p - £2.05 per hour in addition, whereas as directly employed staff, they would be entitled to time and a half. Also, ISS staff who work on Saturdays are paid time and a quarter, whereas directly employed staff are paid time and a half. When they work on a Sunday or a bank holiday, they get time and a half. Again, as NHS staff, they would be paid double time. ISS also pay less than the statutory sick pay allowance for weekends.

Meridian Hospitals PLC, which is the PFI operator for the hospital, must engage in negotiations to settle the dispute. As the PFI operator Meridian subcontracts ISS to carry out the “soft facilities management” work at the hospital and therefore controls the purse strings. Meridian Hospitals paid £2,772,000 in dividends last year.

Those GMB members employed directly by the NHS will be striking in the national pay dispute between 7-11am on November 24. In fact, eleven trade unions representing NHS workers including nurses, midwives, cleaners, pharmacists, scientists, porters, secretaries, paramedics, occupational therapists, radiographers, dieticians, healthcare assistants, kitchen and maintenance staff will participate in the four-hour stoppage. There will also be action short of strike around this date. The POA (the professional trades union for prison, correctional and secure psychiatric workers) and MiP (Managers in Partnership) are also on strike.

Those GMB members employed by ISS at the QEH are holding the two further days of strike action on Monday 24 and Tuesday 25 starting at 6am on the Monday and finishing at 6am on the Tuesday.

Nadine Houghton, GMB Regional Officer, said, “GMB members working for ISS have decided to stage another walk out over the failure of the Trust, the PFI operator Meridian and ISS to pay staff the correct pay and terms and conditions.” The GMB says that there was a “tripartite meeting” held on November 13 between the GMB, the Trust, ISS and Meridian. However, no offer was made at this meeting and the clear message was that “those with the cash to resolve this aren’t as interested in settling the dispute as they should be”. The GMB officials said, “They gave us assurances they were working on the figures to make us an offer but failed to give us anything concrete.”

The GMB first wrote to the Trust and ISS concerning this issue in April. However, it is only now, seven months later in November, after a 24 hours stoppage in October, that they have “actually got round the table with us”. “That is why members are staging these next two days of strike action.”