Annual Report 2016 President Fred Brown General Secretary Manchester Chris Keates Friday 14 April 2017 Honorary Treasurer Monday 17 April 2017 Brian Cookson Contents Introduction 5 Policy: Pay 8 Pensions 18 Conditions of Service 27 Supply Teachers 37 Funding 40 Health and Safety 45 Education 50 Parliamentary 76 Work with the Wider Trade Union Movement 88 International 94 Organising: Industrial Action 103 Equal Opportunities 108 Recruitment 114 Trade Union Education and Training 116 Legal Aid, Benevolence and Services 120 Personal 127 Appendix 1: NASUWT Conferences and Seminars (other than training) 128 Appendix 2: External Conferences, Seminars and Events at which the 133 NASUWT was represented Appendix 3: NASUWT Motions to the TUC, STUC, WTUC, ICTU, 139 TUC Equalities Conferences and International Motions Appendix 4: General Teaching Councils 157 Appendix 5: Affiliations, Donations and Sponsorships (over £500) 159 Appendix 6: Annual Conferences – Devolved Nations/Administrations 160 Appendix 7: Consultation Responses 162 Appendix 8: NASUWT Major Projects, Research and Surveys 166 Appendix 9: Advisory Committee Members 168 Appendix 10: Standing Committees 169 3 INTRODUCTION The year 2016 has been a momentous year. Domestically and globally, we have witnessed events that have shaken the world and changed the course of our history. But, despite these events, the NASUWT has continued to stand strong. In a climate of hostility and attacks on trade unions and workers’ rights, the NASUWT continued to grow. More teachers and school leaders joined and more members engaged in the Union nationally and locally, recognising what the NASUWT has to offer to teachers at every stage of their career. Our national and regional centres, together with the vital work of lay activists, have continued to provide expert assistance to members. Through our first-class legal advice and assistance, we have continued to secure record successes for our members, helping members who have faced threats to their employment or cuts to their pay to secure their rights at work. During the year, we secured record levels of compensation for members following successful claims including unfair dismissal, personal injuries and criminal assault, with over £27 million secured in 2016. Whilst winning compensation for members is and will continue to be important, it has never been an end in itself for the NASUWT. The NASUWT has been actively working to make workplaces safer places for our members, too, with our high-profile health and safety at work campaigns. Ensuring that our decision-making and representational structures are inclusive and representative has also been a key focus of the Union’s work during the year. Consultation conferences, training courses, development courses and a raft of other events have continued to engage more members actively in the life of the Union. We have taken up members’ collective concerns through our active engagement on the national stage with the Trades Union Congress (TUC), Wales TUC (WTUC), Scottish TUC (STUC) and Irish Congress of Trade Unions (ICTU), and also internationally where the NASUWT has been represented on the Executive Board of Education International (EI) and on the Committee of the European Trade Union Committee for Education (ETUCE). Throughout the year, we have put equalities, trade union and workers’ rights and the right of all children and young people to free quality education at the front and centre of our work, whilst also maintaining and advancing our mission of putting teachers first. The NASUWT was alone as the only teachers’ union that maintained an ongoing national trade dispute with governments and administrations across the UK on pay, pensions, working conditions and jobs. With the passage of the Trade Union Act 2016, we continued to step up our campaigning to challenge and confront anti-trade union legislation, and the increasing attacks on workers’ rights and human rights. The Union was the only teachers’ union invited to provide oral evidence to the House of Commons during the passage of this draconian legislation. Whilst opposing the legislation, the NASUWT has also worked to ensure that it is ready to meet the new requirements placed on it as a result of the ideologically driven Trade Union Act 2016 and the Transparency of Lobbying, Non-Party Campaigning and Trade Union Administration Act 2014, both of which contributed to relegating the UK to the lower divisions in the global league table for workers’ rights according to the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC). 5 During the year, support for ‘populist’ and nationalist movements has continued to rise. However, the NASUWT maintained its determination to speak out against wider attacks on human rights and civil liberties. And, with record levels of recorded hate crimes in the weeks and months following the UK European Union (EU) Referendum vote on 23 June, the Union was the first to send a clear message to teachers and to politicians that we would not tolerate these attacks and that we would stand up for our members, at home and abroad, who are impacted as a result of the Brexit vote. The NASUWT Gender Equality Challenge and the Union’s Act for Racial Justice campaigns, together with our work with key politicians on internet safety, have also confirmed our work at the forefront of efforts to challenge prejudice, bigotry and hatred. Whilst defending teachers’ rights has been paramount, so too has been the Union’s work to promote the rights of children and young people. With national elections in Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales, the NASUWT once again highlighted the inextricable link between the rights of teachers and pupils in our campaign for a Vote for Education. The NASUWT’s annual Big Question survey has continued to provide a source of key evidence on the state of the teaching profession in the UK. Together with our programme of in-house and independently commissioned research, the NASUWT continued to provide many thorns in the side of governments and administrations throughout the UK, highlighting teachers’ concerns about workload, pay, pensions and jobs. No other union has done more in this area. Our industrial action also continued to play a key part in our defence of members. No other union took more action to defend teachers, with hundreds of days of strike-action notices issued in 2016 alone. Our determined use of strike action has demonstrated its worth, with employers quickly recognising the importance of engaging in dialogue in order to avoid unnecessary disruption in schools. The NASUWT’s continuous programme of action short of strike action has continued to provide an essential protection for our members, enabling members to walk an appropriate line in terms of the professional expectations placed on them each and every day. Action short of strike action has also been a vital release for members’ anger, enabling NASUWT members to protest against the unjustified and detrimental attacks on their terms and conditions of service. Refusal to teach violent pupils has also remained an important strand of the NASUWT’s industrial-action response to protect and defend members. Nationally, the Union’s determined pursuit of industrial action secured a number of gains in the year, which are documented throughout this report, including: • forcing further action by Government on workload reduction; • securing Ofsted and Estyn clarification documents to challenge unacceptable workload in schools; • three Government reports, launched at the NASUWT Conference, aimed at tackling unreasonable practices associated with marking and assessment, planning and use of data; • bringing employers to the negotiating table to talk about pay and working conditions following the commencement of a rolling programme of national strike action in Northern Ireland; and • securing workload protections for NASUWT members in schools across Scotland. Our pragmatic and determined approach has also secured: • a commitment to partnership working to advance work to improve teachers’ working conditions in Jersey; • social-partnership dialogue in Gibraltar; and • detailed negotiations on pay and pensions affecting members in Guernsey. 6 Our action, policies and strategies, together with the range of information, advice, support and training available for members, has continued to be a critical lifeline for members in an increasingly hostile and uncertain climate. Throughout the year, the NASUWT has continued to deal with the issues affecting members and we have demonstrated, through our work, our capacity to win for members. The detailed work of the Union, including the actions taken in furtherance of Conference Resolutions, is documented throughout this year’s Annual Report. The National Executive is grateful to the work of NASUWT members, activists and staff in delivering another highly successful year for the Union. DRAFT COPY THIS VERSION IS UNPROOFREAD 7 POLICY PAY ENGLAND AND WALES Teachers’ Pay The 2016-17 Pay Award 1.1 The 2016-17 Teachers’ Pay Award was the subject of the 26th Report of the School Teachers’ Review Body (STRB). The remit for the STRB’s 26th Report called for the following matters to be considered: • what adjustments should be made to the salary and allowance ranges for classroom teachers, unqualified teachers and school leaders to promote recruitment and retention within an average pay award of 1%; • what adjustments, if any, should be made to the pay and conditions framework to provide additional flexibilities for schools and incentives to recognise performance; • whether the existing salary-sacrifice arrangements should be extended to provide scope for a salary-advance scheme for rental deposits; and • what changes to the School Teachers’ Pay and Conditions Document (STPCD) may be appropriate following the introduction of new registration-fee arrangements to finance the Welsh Education Workforce Council (EWC). 1.2 In addition, the Secretary of State for Education asked the STRB to consider introducing discretion for schools to allow a teacher to be moved down from the upper pay range to the main pay range. 1.3 In February, the NASUWT met with the STRB to present its oral evidence.