Teachers urged not to strike to avoid ‘damage’ to children’s education
The plea from Downing Street comes as the results of ballots for strikes are due.
Your support helps us to tell the story
From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it's investigating the financials of Elon Musk's pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, 'The A Word', which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.
At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.
The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.
Your support makes all the difference.Teachers should not strike and inflict “substantial damage” to children’s education, Downing Street has urged.
The plea comes as the results of ballots for strikes by two teaching unions are due to be announced.
One of the leaders of the largest education unions in the UK, the National Education Union (NEU), has said she believes the group will have reached the threshold required for strike action.
We would hope they would continue to discuss with us their concerns rather than withdraw education from children
Both the NEU and school leaders’ union NAHT are set to announce on Monday whether there is enough support for walkouts in England and Wales.
Ahead of the strike ballot results, the Prime Minister’s official spokesman said: “We would continue to call on teachers not to strike given we know what substantial damage was caused to children’s education during the pandemic and it’s certainly not something we want to see repeated.
“We would hope they would continue to discuss with us their concerns rather than withdraw education from children.”
From our own internal polling, I think that we will meet the threshold but I can’t be sure
Last week, a ballot of members of the NASUWT teachers’ union failed to reach the 50% turnout threshold, although nine in 10 of those who did vote backed strikes.
But Mary Bousted, joint general secretary of the NEU, believes their union will reach the threshold.
She told Sky News on Monday: “From our own internal polling, I think that we will meet the threshold but I can’t be sure.”
Dr Bousted added that it would be “highly unlikely” that strike action would take place during the exam period.
The NEU will have to give two weeks’ notice of any industrial action.
Speaking to the PA news agency last week, Dr Bousted said the strike days were likely to be in “February and March” if the ballot was successful.
The wave of industrial action which has swept across the country for months will continue this week.
Members of the Royal College of Nursing (RCN) across England will walk out on Wednesday and Thursday and the union has warned that if progress is not made in negotiations by the end of January the next set of strikes will include all eligible members in England for the first time.
The Government continues to insist that pay claims are unaffordable and is sticking to its belief that wage rises should be decided by pay review bodies.
GMB leaders will also meet on Monday to decide whether to call more strikes among their ambulance members because of the lack of progress in talks.
Any decision is likely to be announced later in the week.