HELL hath no fury like a the traditionally right wing beleagured union bureau- Association of Teachers and crat. And few bureaucrats Lecturers, and the controversial call to send home surplus have been as battered as children from over-sized NUT General Secretary classes adopted by the norDoug McAvoy, who has mally Conservalye effectively declared war on NAS/UWT, were the result the majority of his own un- not of 'infiltration' by the ion conference. hard left, but a genuine naOn Sunday April 23 the tion-wide radicalisation in deSunday Times carried a fence of education against witch-hunting (and seriously Tory cuts. inaccurate) article on newiv. It is not the hard left, but the elected NUT Executive mem- Tories who have triggered ber and Oxfordshire district this politicisation of educasecretary Roy Leach, who is a tion by slashing £1 billion supporter of Socialist Outlook. question which McAvoy canThis was no random deci- not answer is how should the sion. unions respond.
McAvoy - whose salary is Interestingly neither of the more than three times that of other teaching unions which most teachers, and whose ex- had voted for action saw their penses, at £18,000 a year, are General Secretaries indulge in more than many of his mem- anything like McAvoy's vitribers are paid - had called in olic attack on the decision. the Murdoch press to do his Parents dirty work after suffering a succession of bruising policy They know that the mass defeats at conference. local demonstrations, public The journalists involved meetings and lobbies that said that McAvoy had been have mobilised parents, govphoning their paper every day ernors and school students since the Blackpool confer- across the country and ence, demanding that they run brought 15,000 onto the an attack on some of the left March 25 FACE demonstrawingers who had the nerve to tion in London were not comwin a majority on the key is- prised of extreme leftists but sues debated there. simply people angered at Worse, McAvoy had arTory cuts. ranged for NUT Head Office The thousands of teachers to supply the hacks with a who have staged protest dossier of information on Roy strikes in Oxfordshire, NotLeach, revealing that NUT oftinghamshire, Leicestershire, ficials keep a 'black list' of Sheffield and other areas left wingers whom they voted freely to do so in ballots clearly regard as fair game for because they are angry at the abuse in the media and possicuts - and because, often for ble victimisation at work.
the first time, they feel the Prejudice impetus of genuine, massive, public support: they are fightIn other words the interests ing not for wages but for the of NUT members are being quality of education. subordinated to McAvoy's Instead of drawing any political prejudices, strength from this unique democratic decisions of movement of parents and elected delegates at the un- governors, brought together ion's conference are regarded in the Fight Against Cuts in not as policy to be imple- Education (FACE), McAvoy mented, but as fair game for has consistently denounced public attack from the union's and opposed it. He sent out highest-paid employee. urging NUT But McAvoy's vicious branches not to participate in witch-hunt against the left is a the FACE demonstration, mark of increasing despera- hinting (without any foundation. He hopes the Tory press tion) that it was a 'front' for will bail him out after his own the SWP. supporters lamentably failed In reality FACE represents to defeat the left in democratic a genuine popular movement, debate. spanning class and party poThe harsh fact he cannot litical divisions: it, far more escape is that the decisions of than McAvoy, speaks for the this year's NUT conference, anger of middle England. like the call for strike ballots Even when it was obvious against rising class sizes from that the march would be very large and that many NUT branches were actively supporting it, McAvoy rejected invitations to participate, suggesting, ludicrously, that the demo 'might lead to violence'.
Having done nothing but sabotage prospects of unity with parents and governors, McAvoy then had the gall to claim at conference that the proposal for NUT action on class sizes might alienate them!
The problem is that McAvoy's chosen allies are not the parents, governors and teachers fighting for education, but Labour's front bench, who have done and said nothing to build that fight.
McAvoy has clearly been working hand in glove with Tony Blair's rightward-moving leadership team, despite the fact that the NUT is not affiliated to the Labour Party, has no voice in its policies, and Blair has delighted in flouting NUT policy, not least by sending his son to an opted out, anti-union school.
Alliance
The political alliance with 'New Labour' was clearly why McAvoy engineered the abandonment of the NUT's boycott of the SATS tests.
And McAvoy shares the Blair/Blunkett hostility to the very notion of industrial action - on anything, at any time, by anyone. Blunkett, who has offered no policies to resolve the crisis in education funding, and has made a crusade out of opposing strikes.
That view is not shared by most NUT conference delegates, many of whom were clearly buoyed up by the confidence that a radical stand in defence of the quality of education would win strong public support.
'Extremists'
McAvoy chose to exploit the ill-judged tactics of a handful of SWP delegates lobbying Blunkett in an attempt to attack all left wing delegates and suggest that the union was being 'taken over by extremists.
In fact McAvoy well knows that the SWP influence at the conference was negligible. The main body of support for left motions came from the Socialist Teachers Alliance.
But in comparison to McAvoy's right wing stance almost anyone prepared to defend education can be regarded as 'extreme'.
Roy Leach is a supporter of Socialist Outlook, and an active member of the STA. But he has been for years.
What has stirred McAvoy to such anger is that Roy led one of the first of this year's protest strikes, and has also been a founding member of the FACE steering committee, showing that it is possible to link with parents and win support.
As a new member of the NUT's NEC Roy will also be 1. haml B for smaller classi Can they really all be extremists? McAvoy opposes all forms of action. in a position to refute many of McAvoy's brazen lies about FACE, and join a strengthened left.
It's not the majority of delegates who are out of step, but McAvoy. The proximity of his face to Tony Blair's backside appears to obscure first UT his view of reality.
NUT members must demand that McAvoy and his caucus of witch-hunters stop attacking and victimising his own members and start doing what he's paid so lavishly to do - defending the policies of the union.