International Socialists

Andrew Cooper

While the latest round of the teachers’ dispute may be over for now, the long-term problems facing our education system aren’t.

There are several key problems.

First is a long-term but drastic fall in teachers’ real income. Teachers’ salaries today have around 20-30 percent less buying power than in 1980. This, of course, is not a problem restricted to teachers. During much of the 70s and 80s inflation remained high but most workers were able to win pay rises at or above the level of inflation, so their real incomes at least stood still or increased slightly.

For the past decade, pay rises for the vast majority of workers have been almost non-existent. If this were happening in a period of high inflation it would mean a sudden drop in real income and provoke industrial action in response. When inflation is mostly below three percent however, you don’t really notice a very small reduction in your spending power from year to year. But, after a decade of this, many workers are now really feeling a drop of up to 30 percent in their incomes.

Another problem is the competitive model in schools, which now have to "promote" themselves by advertising and competing against other schools. Apart from its inherent absurdities, the competitive model has also meant more work for teachers around such things as ERO visits.

A third factor behind the current unrest is the increase in social problems teachers have to deal with. Increasing inequality and poverty means more behavioural problems for students in poorer schools. Teachers increasingly have to act as social workers as well as dealing with more problems in the classroom.

Finally, the new qualifications system, the NCEA, was the straw that broke the camel’s back. Whatever its merits it was obvious that it would involve a significant increase in workload on a group of workers already strained to breaking point.

So the crisis in secondary education is the result of several long-term factors. Its manifestations are increasing workloads and problems recruiting and retaining staff. Teachers see pay and workload as the key issues, and despite government claims, the two can’t be separated. Only better pay and conditions will attract new teachers – and only new teachers who stay in the job can effectively reduce overall workloads.

It’s estimated that the average age of teachers is now about 46, and that most new teachers only last one to two years in the job.

With all this in mind, it’s little wonder that teachers reacted so angrily to their union leadership’s acceptance of an "offer" that effectively meant pay cuts (5.5 percent over three years – less than inflation) and an insultingly low payment for extra NCEA work.

The PPTA’s rotten deals do nothing to address the real concerns of teachers – let alone the more fundamental problems with the education system.

The corporate media has been quick to label the teachers’ actions as hurting students – as if a few days rostering off was the cause of the problem! It’s important to emphasise that in resisting attempts to increase their workload further, teachers are actually fighting to improve students’ conditions too, just as striking nurses are protesting about cuts in health services as much as their own conditions.

We have to see the crisis in education as part of a much wider attack on living standards that includes unemployment, declining healthcare and falling real wages for most workers. Any attempt to tilt the balance in our favour again must broaden its sights towards a goal of addressing all these attacks.