Meet the challenge: fight the Green Paper
By a delegate to NUT conference
The vast majority of teachers are hostile to the proposals contained in the government’s Green Paper "Teachers: Meeting the Challenge of Change" which advocates radical changes to the pay and conditions of teachers in England and Wales. The real question is not whether the Green Paper should be opposed, but how can it be defeated.
If implemented, the proposals in the Green Paper will alter the pay and conditions of teachers in a fundamental way. The government has tried to link the worsened conditions to improvements in pay.
Systematic attack
However the reality is that this year’s pay award shows that the Blair government has no intention of rewarding teachers for the difficult job that they do: rather the insulting pay award and the Green Paper are both part of a systematic attack on teachers and their unions.
Education Minister, David Blunkett has already let it be known that he would relish a fight with the main teachers’ union, the National Union of Teachers (NUT). The NUT conference over Easter week-end will allow him to attack teachers in the media whilst, no doubt, trying to project a different image to the teachers assembled in Brighton.
The Green Paper proposes the introduction of Performance Related Pay for teachers. Teachers would be subject to appraisal arrangements which would determine whether or not they were granted an annual pay award.
The National Union of Teachers was formed to fight payment by results last century. The arguments that were valid then are equally true to-day. Teaching is a collective activity.
Who can really determine the impact of an individual teacher on the progress of a child? A secondary teacher builds on the work of primary teachers who, in turn, build on the work of those employed in nurseries. A Geography teacher’s results will partly depend on progress made in English, Maths and Science.
The Green Paper also proposes important structural changes to the teaching force. Teachers will be ‘invited’ to apply to ‘cross the threshold’ to achieve a pay rise. Crossing the threshold will mean accepting the right of management to impose extra hours and responsibilities.
The Green Paper argues that most teachers will eventually cross the threshold, however the reality is that the funding available is totally inadequate to deliver the required resources. The proposals would also divide up teachers in a range of different categories: new teachers, pre and post threshold and those in the Leadership Group.
In addition to the impact on teachers, the proposals will have a serious and detrimental effect on education. Teachers in schools in better-off areas and working class schools with strong leaderships will be more likely to get pay awards than those in struggling working class schools in the inner-cities. The result will be a further shift of resources away from those areas who need it the most.
There will be a major debate on the Green Paper at NUT conference. What is required is a total rejection of the proposals and a serious fight to back up that rejection.
Currently, the NUT leadership is proposing a lobby of Parliament and an indicative ballot on boycotting appraisal. Both these proposals deserve support, but they are nowhere near enough. There is danger of some on the left not understanding that all official union initiatives need to be supported. Although the lobby does provide a national focus and is really a way of getting publicity, it does give the left an opportunity to build up confidence amongst broader layers in the union.
Appraisal should be boycotted, but the chances are that the new appraisal arrangements will be introduced in a manner that avoids an immediate confrontation. In well-organised schools appraisal schemes have not operated for years.
The proposal for national strike action is the key demand. It is the only demand that begins to meet the seriousness of the situation. What the union leadership is currently offering is totally inadequate. However, NUT chief Doug McAvoy probably judges it might be enough to allow him to appear radical in the run-up to the General Secretary’s election, where he faces a strong challenge from left-winger Christine Blower.
Over the next period the left needs to build the existing union initiatives whilst pointing out their inadequacy. At the same time, we need to continually bring the left together, including serious united left support for Christine Blower’s challenge to McAvoy.