England’s biggest teaching union will next week launch a formal ballot to decide whether sixth-form college members will strike over pay.
The NEU teaching union, which represents most teachers in the sixth-form sector, has said its ballot will open on Tuesday 18 October and close on Friday 11 November.
It said its sixth-form members had voted in an indicative ballot - with 76.6 per cent turnout and 97 per cent support - for a pay rise to exceed the retail prices index (RPI) measure of inflation, which was 11.7 per cent at the point when the pay claim was submitted.
The current pay offer from the Sixth Form Colleges Association (SFCA) essentially mirrors the pay rise being offered to school teachers in England, with most seeing an increase of 5 per cent.
And the union says that it has now informed the government and employers of its intentions.
Dr Mary Bousted, joint general secretary of the NEU, said teachers in sixth-form colleges had “suffered a real-terms pay cut in the region of 20 per cent since 2010” and in “the midst of a cost-of-living crisis, are not prepared to see their income fall further”.
“No one wants to take strike action, but year after year of below-inflation pay increases have now had a major impact on the value of their pay,” she added.
“Government needs to address what is now a serious problem for the sector.”
The threat of wider teacher strikes over pay
The NEU’s wider membership is also in discussions over whether to strike. Last month the union opened a preliminary ballot over strike action, which closes on Friday.
This is the same deadline that the Department for Education was given to take “urgent” action over pay rises to avoid a full ballot on strike action, in a letter from the NEU to the education secretary sent last week.
The union warned Kit Malthouse that if he did not “undertake to make immediately available” the funds to allow schools “to increase the pay of [school] staff, at a rate greater than the rate of inflation”, then the union would be “in a trade dispute” with him.
The NAHT school leaders’ union also recently launched a consultation with its members over their views on pay and funding, while the NASUWT teaching union has said it is “committed” to balloting its members on industrial action in the autumn term if an improved pay deal is not offered.
And earlier this month the Association of School and College Leaders released the results of its survey of school leaders, which asked whether the union should run an indicative ballot for action short of strike action and an indicative ballot on strike action.
Half of the school leaders surveyed said the union should run an indicative ballot on strike action, but half of respondents said the union should not take this step.
The school standards minister warned at the Conservative Party Conference last week that the government will “not budge” on this year’s pay offer for teachers.
The DfE has been contacted for comment.
