180 schools affected by nationwide strike over pensions
MORE than 180 schools are shut or partially closed today as teachers joined a nationwide strike over proposed pension changes.
Members of the National Union of Teachers (NUT) and the Association of Teachers and Lecturers stayed off work today in their row with the Government.
The proposals, which include raising the retirement age for teachers to bring it in line with the state pension age, could see their final salaries replaced with a career average once they retire.
The strike left thousands of children enjoying a day off school and working parents having to find alternative childcare arrangements.
Vic Goodwin, the NUT's Staffordshire secretary, said: "We realise the problems with the economy, but they are not of our making.
"We are being made to pay for things that are not our fault.
"We are saying there should be a fair pension for all. It's not just about people working in the public sector."
NUT members from Staffordshire and Stoke-on-Trent were due to attend a rally in Birmingham today, while some college lecturers across North Staffordshire also took part in the strike action.
Members of the University and College Union (UCU) were due to enjoy a picketers' breakfast of oatcakes as they manned a picket line at Newcastle College early today.
Joe Cerkeliunas, UCU branch chairman of the college, is among the lecturers who could be significantly hit by the proposed pension changes.
The 56-year-old said: "I will have to pay around an extra £80 per month for my pension, which will be cut by around £4,900 per year if I retire at 60.
"I would only get my full occupational pension at 66, when I'd be old, probably deaf and toothless, and certainly in no state to enjoy my retirement."
The strike has shut or partially closed 62 schools in Stoke-on-Trent, 76 in Cheshire East and 43 in Staffordshire.
Many parents last night complained that their children were being affected by the strikes.
Leighton Hospital worker Heidi Eason, aged 40, who has three sons at Gainsborough Primary School, in Crewe, said: "Today's strikes are about pensions, but everyone has a pension and all of us couldn't go on strike.
"Teachers are paid pretty well and they get a lot of holidays so I don't know what they are complaining about."
Unemployed Debbie Cadman, aged 39, whose five-year-old daughter, Lucy, attends the same school, said: "I can appreciate the teachers' arguments, but I don't think teachers striking or striking in general will make a difference to David Cameron."
In Stoke-on-Trent, John Baskeyfield VC CE Primary, in Burslem, is among the schools shut today.
Jenny Miller, aged 21, whose five-year-old daughter, Jessica, goes to the school, said: "The whole thing is ridiculous. The teachers have made the children suffer."
Grandmother Jenny Wynne, aged 50, of Chell, has offered to look after her three-year-old grandson, Callum, because his mum is at work.
She said: "It's made things awkward for working people to try to sort out childcare. I don't think the teachers should be striking over their pensions."
Teachers have been joined on strike by members of the Public and Commercial Services Union (PCS).
Their dispute against proposed pension changes was due to hit Jobcentres and benefits payments offices.
And in Crewe, dozens of Fujitsu workers were holding a one-day strike in support of a union colleague.
The Sentinel reported yesterday that Jackfield Infants' School, in Burslem, and The Co-operative Academy at Brownhills, in Tunstall, would be closed today. In fact, they are partially closed.
Do you support the strikes?
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by fredthefrib
Thursday, June 30 2011, 8:15PM
“Unless we are all on the same pension provision its unfair for the people in private employment to subsidise people in public employment, which is what happens now.
Most people in private employment aren't looked after at all,no made up sick pay, no severance pay when made redundant, no early retirement payments and no inflation proof pension entitlement.
Which comes first the chicken or the egg.
Without the private sector there would be no public sector.
There should be equal pension provision, paid for by all by the same percentage of wage taken as provision from all employees all the way up to the top."”
by fredthefrib
Thursday, June 30 2011, 8:11PM
“Unless we are all on the same pension provision its unfair for the people in private employment to subsidise people in public employment, which is what happens now.
Most people in private employment aren't looked after at all,no made up sick pay, no severance pay when made redundant, no early retirement payments.
Which comes first the chicken or the egg.
Without the private sector there would be no public sector.
There should be equal pension provision, paid for by all by the same percentage of wage taken as provision from all employees all the way up to the top.”
by Longton101
Thursday, June 30 2011, 7:44PM
“I'd like to know just how many hairdressing appointments, sun-bed sessions and manicures were missed today and how this will effect industry, as we all know what some of the stay at home mums get up to....lol.”
by Arthur2011
Thursday, June 30 2011, 7:37PM
“It's quite interesting how the working class are happy to turn on each other over workers rights. Instead of fighting among themselves, they should stick together and demand decent pensions at a decent age for ALL workers. But instead, we choose to believe the propaganda put out by the Sun, Daily Mail and other right wing media, making the Governments job of keeping is in our places so much easier.
As George Orwell wrote "For if leisure and security were enjoyed by all alike, the great mass of human beings who are normally stupefied by poverty would become literate and would learn to think for themselves ; and when once they had done this, they would sooner or later realize that the privileged minority had no function, and they would sweep it away. In the long run, a hierarchical society was only possible on a basis of poverty and ignorance. "”
by DoctorDo
Thursday, June 30 2011, 5:43PM
“Markiegj, it's a myth that the public sector earn less than the private, you'll struggle to find many people in the public sector on minimum wage. Also the lowest paid workers are being protected from the pension changes. As for your assertion that the public sector don't get bonuses, this is just incorrect. The civil service have been paying 'performance' bonuses for years. They even paid out a bonus a couple of years ago to staff who'd made it into work through a light snow flurry. Add to this job security which the rest of us can only dream of and their lot is not such an unhappy one.”
by Andy2309
Thursday, June 30 2011, 5:37PM
“When teachers and other public sector workers are paying pension contributions as high as police officers currently do (11% - the highest in the public sector), then I might have some sympathy for them!”
by mightymousse
Thursday, June 30 2011, 5:26PM
“Like the comment that at 66 when we will all get our state pension this person reckons that they will in no fit state to enjoy it. Well as not being in the public sector I can only dream of the pension that these people will get, they should get real as if they win the deal they are after the only way it can be afforded is to raise taxes considerably there fore affecting EVERYBODY not just them.”
by markiegj
Thursday, June 30 2011, 5:22PM
“My pension that I have (private sector) is very close to the public one. Public sector workers pay into it so its their money.
A 15k job in the public sector is a 18k Job in the private. Add that up over all the years off your working like who has the better deal ???? Also Public sector workers do not get bonus's where I do”
by DoctorDo
Thursday, June 30 2011, 4:22PM
“My wife is a public sector employee so we are directly affected by what's happening. That said I don't see why the public sector feel they should have better pensions than the rest of us.
When Gordon Brown delivered his first budget in 1997 he taxed personal and company pensions to the tune of £5billion per year. This is why many company schemes went into deficit and changed from defined benefit schemes into career average or simple money purchase schemes. I don't recall hearing of any civil servants in the Treasury complaining about what was happening to our pension funds. But now the axe is falling on their own schemes they want the public to support them. The very public who will be the ones who need to pay for public sector pensions. The very public who will have to increase contributions to their own schemes massively just to maintain their pre-Brown value.
The public sector unions supported Gordon Brown and what he did to the pensions of ordinary working class people. They're nothing but hypocrites.
People who are struggling to pay their own pension are being asked to give public sector workers fully funded pensions with defined benefits, it's just not fair.”
by A_Reader
Thursday, June 30 2011, 4:17PM
“Teachers pay taxes too. Some people seem to think that public sector workers don't pay taxes. I wish!”