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Pay and pensions
Pay and pensions under attack
The coalition Government plans to impose real-terms cuts in pay and pensions across the public sector, hitting teachers hard. NUT salary and pensions specialists Andrew Morris and Nick Kirby explain what the proposals will mean for you, and what you can do to oppose them.
Defend our pay!
Pay will be a central issue for NUT members over the coming year as the coalition Government imposes its proposed public sector pay freeze.
School teachers in England and Wales received a 2.3 per cent pay increase from 1 September 2010 – the final stage of the three-year pay settlement put forward by the School Teachers’ Review Body, which the NUT and others persuaded the new Government not to overturn. Although this is in line with average pay settlements in private and public sectors, it is a real-terms pay cut, as RPI (Retail Prices Index) inflation is currently over twice as high, at 4.8 per cent.
Other NUT members are still waiting to hear about their 2010 pay rise. Soulbury-paid members in local authority central services are threatened by the pay freeze facing all local government employees. Sixth form colleges are refusing to make teachers an offer until the Comprehensive Spending Review is published in October.
Tough times ahead
From 2011, the Government has said it wants a pay freeze across the whole public sector for all but the lowest paid. No NUT member in England or Wales would get any pay increase in 2011 or 2012 under this proposal. The NUT has already warned that this will have an immediate effect on recruitment and retention as the economy elsewhere begins to recover.
After years of below-inflation pay increases, teachers are already beginning to feel the squeeze. Next year things look set to get worse. Not only will teachers and other public sector workers have to contend with a pay freeze, but the price of goods and services will rise significantly due to the increase in VAT from 17.5 per cent to 20 per cent in January 2011.
Families with a combined income of over £40,000 will have their tax credits cut from April 2011, while child benefit will be frozen and other payments, including the ‘health in maternity’ grant and child trust fund contributions, will stop altogether. At the same time, this summer’s extreme weather – from the floods in Asia to droughts and forest fires in Russia – means the cost of commodities such as wheat and cotton is soaring. The result will be higher prices in supermarkets and clothing stores in the coming months.
Meanwhile the UK economy is showing signs of recovery. The recession officially ended at the start of this year, the budget deficit is lower than forecast, and banks such as Northern Rock, Lloyds and RBS, which had to be bailed out by the taxpayer in 2008, are once again reporting healthy profits. Private sector companies, which may have frozen employees’ pay or cut their hours during the recession, are starting to increase them again.
The NUT is worried that by imposing a public sector pay freeze and drastically reducing investment in education and other public services, the Government risks plunging the UK into a ‘double-dip’ recession. The Union is also concerned about the anti-public sector sentiment being whipped up in the press. Media reports and politicians’ comments about ‘pointless jobs’, ‘excessive waste’ and ‘gold-plated pensions’ are misleading and create tension between workers in the private and state sectors.
What this means to you
• Fewer pounds in your pocket.
• No pay rise in 2011 or 2012.
• Tax credit cuts for families earning over £40,000.
• Higher prices in the high street.
• Pay rise in 2010 = 2.3 per cent. RPI = 4.8 per cent.
• VAT increase from 17.5 to 20 per cent in January 2011.
Taking action
The NUT will be campaigning with other TUC public sector unions to defend public services and pay, starting with a lobby of Parliament on 19 October – the day before the Government is due to announce the outcome of its spending review.
We will also be campaigning against the planned cuts in pay and pensions at the TUC and party political conferences this autumn.
Support the campaign:
• Contact your MP and ask him or her to oppose the public sector pay freeze.
• Make colleagues aware of the implications of the Government’s proposals.
• Get involved in NUT and TUC initiatives to defend public sector pay and investment. Look for details in future editions of The Teacher, and online at
www.teachers.org.uk and
www.tuc.org.uk.
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