Kia ora e te Whānau, You will have noticed the posters around the school Time 4 Teachers, Time 4 Tamariki.

You may be aware of the recent union meetings where Primary and Area school teachers turned out in huge numbers and have overwhelmingly voted to reject the Ministry of Education’s collective agreement offers, including the government’s public service pay offer which was less than 7% for most experienced teachers over a 2 year period. (For most teachers this would mean pay increases lower than the cost of living increases.)

Along with the pay offer, a significant reason for rejecting the Ministry offer was that it did not address exhausting work demands or the need for more support for students. Teachers felt that there was no real movement around release time and the non-contact time which helped teachers to find new ways of supporting tamariki.

The current offer is for an extra 30 mins per week for classroom teachers. There was also a lack of information about steps for learning support. Having Learning Support available at an early age can make such a difference. Reducing class sizes was also not addressed in the offer.

Across Aotearoa we are seeing colleagues leave the profession because their workload was too high and they feel under supported in large classes with a wide range of Learning and Behavioural needs.

We would love your continued support for our campaign which includes improvement to teacher to student ratio, more release time and to receive a cost of living adjustment to pay. You could do this by messaging our local MP or just chatting to friends and colleagues about the NZEI negotiations.

NZEI Te Riu Roa negotiation teams will go back to the Ministry of Education to tell them the offers are rejected.

Union members are now discussing plans for future action if the offer does not improve following further negotiations, this includes meeting with MPs and more union meetings in Term 1 next year.

We will keep you informed of any developments.

Ngā mihi nui.

Clare Byers

NZEI Representative.