Conference 2023

continued from page 17 said she was proud to be part of a union full of strong women demanding change.

“Seventy-six per cent of members are women, 75 per cent of teachers are women. However, there are no local rules to ensure the representation of women from districts.

“Women face additional barriers in society – care, sexism or pay disparity. If these barriers are preventing women from coming to conference it’s our responsibility to do something about it.”

Refugees and anti-racism

Members voted to pass a motion that the union will continue to integrate refugees, asylum seekers and migrants into their schools and communities and oppose Government policies that appeal to racism.

Jenny Sutton from Hastings recounted a recent experience of being subjected to vitriolic abuse at a demonstration in Sussex supporting refugees. “This was not the organised far right, it was local people, and the way they were talking about the threat they faced from refugees was something I’ve never experienced before. It was Suella Braverman’s rhetoric seeping into the sponge of poverty and deprivation,” said Jenny.

OUTGOING president Louise Atkinson gave a moving speech to conference in which she told delegates that a love of school had helped her navigate a turbulent childhood growing up in poverty. Her experience of education had inspired her to become a teacher, so she could help others.

But, she said, the Government makes that ambition difficult by its failure to properly fund education. “Schools and colleges are beyond breaking point after years of being asked to do more with less.” Recalling the dire lack of resources and staff at one school where she worked, Louise said: “No matter how hard I worked, every day I felt I had failed the kids. But I didn’t. Chronic underfunding and a complete disregard for education by this Tory Government failed them.”

She condemned Ofsted as “out of touch, unfair and unreliable” and the pressure it puts on staff as insurmountable.

She spoke of her pride in the achievements of the union this year, including smashing the anti-trade

Reasonable adjustments passport Conference passed a motion to raise awareness of the reasonable adjustments disability passport, which documents what union thresholds in the pay ballot, organising across 24,000 workplaces and mobilising 50,000 members to march in London.

“I have always been immensely proud to be an NEU member, but never more so than this year – because you have taken unprecedented action to save our schools. We have shown our strength and our unity, and we have absolutely shaped education for the better. We have only been successful because we have all worked together for a common good. Our fight goes on.” someone is entitled to under the Equality Act 2010, among employers to help disabled members stay in the profession. Only two per cent of NEU members self-identify as

Kevin Courtney: ‘We are going to win both funding and a pay rise’

KEVIN Courtney used his last conference speech as joint general secretary to celebrate the NEU’s successes in its first five years, before rallying members to keep up their fight for a decent pay offer.

In his impassioned address, he told members the NEU had become one of the most influential trade unions in the country. “The NEU, your union, won billions for school funding in our campaigns from 2017 to 2019. The NEU, your union, made schools and communities safer in 2020 and 2021. The NEU, your union, built for ballot success in 2022, and is leading the movement in 2023,” he said.

Cheering and applause filled the auditorium.

“We are going to win both funding and a pay rise in England,” he told members in Harrogate, who once again broke out into applause. “The Government is not reading the room. It really should be worrying about your capacity to campaign, to win parental support, to pressure politicians.

“Mary and I and the rest of you in conference will be leading from the front on that. However, Mary and I have only five more months and it is just conceivable we might not win on our watch. But you are going to win –I have every confidence in that.”

Paying tribute to Mary, he said she had enormous drive and passion, and a huge capacity for hard work. “Mary’s passion has been to build a union that can change the future of education –and, in particular, to change the future of Ofsted to a very short future indeed.”

He said the Government was “rattled” by the action taken on pay by members and was reacting foolishly. Union activists were praised by Kevin for mobilising tens of thousands of members.

“It is you, the union activists, who are fundamental,” he said.

“You organised to get 50,000 NEU members to the biggest weekday demonstration for years (15 March), despite a Tube strike. It was such a celebration of teacher determination, solidarity and joy.”

To the 57,000 new members who have joined the NEU since the strikes were announced, Kevin gave a warm welcome.

As his speech drew to a close, Kevin urged members: “Keep going, because you will win for education. You will make the change teachers, support staff and students need. You will replace Ofsted, win on free school meals. You will win on pay and funding. Keep going. Keep going.

“And thank you so much for so many great years.”

IN her last address to annual conference, NEU joint general secretary Mary Bousted criticised the Education Secretary for being “airily unconcerned” about the problems facing the profession.

Conference erupted into huge applause and cheers, as Mary accused Gillian Keegan of being “deluded” about the scale of the workforce crisis facing education. “You are living in a fantasy world, Gillian. I’d like to be, too, but I just can’t seem to get there,” she said, prompting laughter from the audience of around 1,200 delegates.

“It is your job to ensure there are enough teachers and support staff in our schools. It is your job to make the strongest case to the Treasury that education needs funding so that our schools can recruit and retain teachers and support staff. And to make the working lives of teachers and leaders better, so that they are willing to stay in the profession. Do your job, Gillian.”

Speaking just days after members voted to reject a new, insulting and unfunded pay offer, prompting more disabled, but the union believes that figure should be between 14 to 20 per cent to reflect the general working population. The TUC developed the passport, in which adjustments such as an appropriate chair, time off for disability-related appointments or a temporary change of duties can be logged.

These details are regularly reviewed, so the disabled member does not keep having to explain their adjustment needs every time their line manager changes.

Proposing the motion, Deborah Leigh from Manchester said disabled members are frequently subjected to intolerance, passive aggression and bullying at work. One in ten disabled workers dropped out of employment last year, said Deborah, and a passport would help to avoid job losses.

LGBT+ students

Members passed a motion that the union will fight to raise the aspirations of LGBT+ students and make education more inclusive.

Sara Ann Hope said that in a survey conducted in 2021 by the charity Just Like Us, 91 per cent of students had heard negative language about LGBT+ people being used in the last year. LGBT+ students are twice as likely to experience bullying at school and twice as likely to contemplate suicide.

“Half of pupils had heard zero positive messages about being gay. It has been two strike days planned for 27 April and 2 May, Mary said 50,000 members had marched on 15 March because they are angry. “Members are saying: enough is enough. Pay our profession properly for the vital, essential job it does and fund education so we can do the job we know needs doing,” she said.

Today’s crumbling schools and child poverty were signs of a return to the dire state of schools under Margaret Thatcher’s Government in 1982 when Mary qualified as an decades since Section 28 was repealed. Why are we still having to fight for our right to be recognised? The spectre of that awful piece of legislation is hanging over our schools like a Dickensian ghost.”

Urgent motion on Ofsted

An urgent motion calling for the union to continue its campaign for Ofsted and Wales’s inspectorate Estyn to be replaced was passed by conference. The motion, submitted following the suicide of member and primary head Ruth Perry, also called for the NEU to work with other unions to urge leadership members to refuse to participate in inspections until a full health and safety assessment of the system is carried out.

Proposing, chair of the NEU national leadership council and deputy head Chris Dutton said: “Sadly, Ruth was not the first, but, conference, we must make sure she is the last. We need to unite as a profession to bring Ofsted down.”

Since 1998 coroners’ inquests into the suicides of at least ten teachers have heard they took their own life before or after an Ofsted inspection, said Chris.

“It’s time to replace Ofsted with a school accountability system that is supportive, effective and fair. Ofsted is not fit for purpose. Ofsted is toxic. Ofsted needs to go.” n You can call Samaritans free on 116 123

English teacher. “Here we are again – left with a crisis in public services, a crisis borne out of neglect, out of mismanagement, and out of a disgust that Tory politicians have for people who work in public services.”

She said fewer and fewer graduates are choosing teaching, while those already in the profession are quitting in huge numbers. Children and the educators remaining are bearing the brunt.

Mary then turned her attention to Ofsted, issuing a plea to school leaders to stop working as Ofsted inspectors.

“Refuse to be part of an inspection team until we have an inspectorate which commands respect, which supports schools to improve.”

Concluding her goodbye speech, Mary thanked fellow joint secretary Kevin Courtney for his support and friendship. “He lives his ideals of antisexism and anti-racism, of equality for all, every single day. And he has always treated me as a valued equal.”

For members, Mary had some final words: “Be proud of your union. I am.”

INCOMING NEU general secretary

Daniel Kebede said it was a great honour to be elected and he was “sobered by the enormous responsibility that has been placed on me”. He paid tribute to Mary Bousted and Kevin Courtney for the tremendous work they have done.

Daniel went on to say his role, which he takes up in September, would be important, but “I will be just a cog in the machine” that is made up of half a million dedicated people working for the betterment of society.

“This Government has abused our profession’s dedication. We need an end to pay cuts. We need an end to people working late into the night at the end of a busy day. How can this country have a bright future when this Government refuses to invest in it?”