New strike looms as primary teachers and principals reject latest offer from Goverment

April 8, 2019

Thousands of primary teachers walked off the job last August.

Primary school teachers and principals have rejected the latest Government offer for their collective agreements, and warn strike action is possible.

NZEI president Lynda Stuart said they were fighting for "significantly" improved time, pay and support offers.

"We will be going straight back to the Government with that message," she said in a statement today.

Just under 30,000 teachers and principals voted to turn down the deal.

There will be union meetings held in early May, and if progress isn't made they could vote on work to rule strike actions, followed by a national strike on May 29. 

Ministry of Education's Ellen MacGregor-Reid said the pay offer would give more than 30,000 primary teachers a 3 per cent pay rise every year for three years and access to higher maximum steps in the pay scale.

"We remain available to negotiate with the NZEI over how the almost $700 million available to settle the primary teachers’ and principals’ collectives is best apportioned, and to discuss how other aspects of their claims may be considered over time."

"If NZEI and their members choose to take further strike action, that will cause disruption for parents and for children and we would like to avoid that so we are here and we would like to keep talking from whenever the union is ready to do so."

NZEI's Sose Annandale, who was on the principals’ negotiating team, said the latest offer was "very similar" to November's rejected offer, saying the Government had refused to "budge from its 'envelope' of $698 million over four years".

National’s education spokesperson Nikki Kaye said the Government needs to offer more to stop the strike action going ahead.

"We’re eleven months in, this is heading for the third strike and we need the Government to provide a circuit breaker to resolve this,"she said.

Ms Kaye said the Government needs to act to reduce teaching ratios and teacher workload.

"I think it is important to own some responsibility (under National) but there was a very different set of circumstances, this Government has billions of dollars and has chosen to prioritise spending on students over teachers.

"This Government is halfway through their parliamentary term, it’s not credible to keep blaming National," she said.

Education Minister Chris Hipkins was not available for an interview.

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Thousands of primary teachers walked off the job last August in an attempt to combat what they said was an underfunded education sector. Union members voted in an "overwhelming majority" to increase a scheduled three-hour strike on August 15 into a full day of action. 

In the big cities and in small towns teachers turned out in force.

In November, they carried out rolling strikes across the country for a week-long protest. 

If approved, primary and secondary teachers would walk off the job together.

Secondary teachers were intending to strike again on April 3. However, due to the Christchurch terrorist attacks, it was called off. 


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