The Scottish government has a fixed budget with the cash already committed - so bigger pay rises for teachers and school leaders will mean cuts elsewhere, says education secretary Shirley-Anne Somerville.
That has been her defence of the government’s decision not to put the “substantially improved” pay offer on the table that the unions were demanding in order to call off today’s strike action - which has closed the vast majority of Scottish schools and is the first national teacher strike over pay in Scotland since the 1980s.
But Dr Bernadette Casey, the special-school headteacher who became president of primary leaders’ body AHDS earlier this month, says the pay offer that was tabled earlier this week is “insulting” and, when it comes to school leaders, is actually worse than the previous offer of a 5 per cent rise across the board.
This latest offer - which the EIS teaching union described as a “reheating of the previously rejected offer” - would have resulted in the majority of teachers still receiving a 5 per cent uplift, with probationers offered the biggest rise at 6.85 per cent.
However, when it came to school leaders, the pay rise was capped at £3,000 for those earning over £60,000.
In an interview with Tes Scotland, Casey says: “The most experienced teachers and school leaders are being compromised. There is no recognition of the work that was done to keep schools open during the pandemic or the ongoing ‘above and beyond’ support that we give to our children, young people and families.”
Teacher strikes over pay
She is calling on the Scottish government and local authorities’ organisation Cosla to get creative with their budgets - just as headteachers are so frequently asked to do with their school budgets.
“As headteachers, we have to juggle our budgets and sometimes you have to take from one pot to give to another. You prioritise and make the best use of the money. Things always pop up unexpectedly,” she says.
However, Casey - who leads Hillside School, a special school in East Ayrshire, and a supported learning centre based in the high school on the same campus - is also clear that this year’s pay claim was not unexpected and the government should have been planning for it.
The government knew, she says, that teachers would be looking for a more substantial rise this year after the unions accepted 2.22 per cent last year - which for school leaders was capped at £800.
“Last year we accepted a very low increase with the proviso that in the coming year we would be looking for a bigger percentage increase,” says Casey.
She adds: “It’s quite sad because none of us want to strike but we feel that the time has come where we have to have our voice heard.”
Just over 85 per cent of AHDS members voted for strike action - based on a turnout of 63 per cent - and on Tuesday evening the association was the first union out of the blocks to reject the government and councils’ 11th-hour pay offer.
AHDS general secretary Greg Dempster says he had hoped strike action could be averted but the offer was not made “in good faith to try and avoid the strikes”.
He was “stunned” that the new deal put on the table was differentiated, meaning it was actually a worse deal for many primary school leaders than the flat rate of 5 per cent for all teaching staff that had been rejected previously .
Some media outlets reported that high-earning headteachers - who can make up to £100,000 a year - were rejecting a £3,000 pay rise but Dempster takes issue with that portrayal. He says the majority of AHDS members are “nowhere near £100,000 and are much nearer the starting point on the headteachers’ scale”.
He also points out that there is a headteacher recruitment crisis and that will not be solved if there is no improved financial incentive to take on the job.
“It’s not a job that can be done in anything like the contracted hours, and headteachers are being called on relentlessly to work in the evening and at weekends in order to do their best for their schools and their pupils. They are the jam that is spread extremely thinly to make schools work.”
Casey echoes this, adding that it is not just heads and teachers who deserve a better deal - she also believes it is time pupil support assistants were given the recognition they deserve.
She says that these highly skilled individuals are essential to the smooth running of special schools, in particular, but at the moment that is not reflected in their wages.
Casey adds: “We have ‘classroom assistants’ in East Ayrshire; in other authorities it is ‘pupil support assistants’ or ‘learning assistants’. They have got different pay scales in different authorities. That’s not fair - there has to be some parity and consistency across the country and definitely a recognition of the skills and commitment that these staff bring with them.”
If there was a national pay scale, Casey says support staff in the specialist sector would be “at the top because of the specialised nature of the support they have to give”.
“These really committed individuals are the ones that make a difference in the lives of children and young people.”
A Scotland-wide discussion is underway about pupil support staff that, according to the Education Scotland website, is seeking to “empower and assist” these “critical members of our learning communities”. The information here talks about determining a vision and values for the workforce and developing a skills framework and a professional learning framework, as well as “future support” - but there is no explicit mention of pay.
The Scottish government working group set up to improve the quality of pupil support in Scotland does, however, have “career progression routes and remuneration” as part of its remit.
Nevertheless, in the current climate - with inflation sky high and governments pleading poverty - it is going to be tough for any profession to get a fair deal on pay.
But if the strikes are to end, a compromise will have to be found.
It is in everyone’s interest that this happens quickly.
