Support staff working in schools in Croydon and across the country are losing out on millions of pounds in pay because of unfair, term-time-only contracts, research by the GMB union has found.
Small portions: school catering staff receive no pay for at least eight weeks each year
Teaching assistants, catering staff, caretakers, administration staff and others are only paid 44 weeks a year and they can’t claim benefits during the school holidays. These workers, essential to the smooth running of state schools, are usually among the lowest paid staff.
School teachers are paid a salary for the entire year.
Other council workers – who negotiate for pay alongside school support staff as part of the National Joint Council agreement – are also paid for the full 12 months of the year.
The GMB claims that if its members who work as support staff were paid for the full 52 weeks of the year, their individual wages would increase by up to £4,094. “With around 800,000 school support staff on term-time only contracts, the workforce as a whole was down to the tune of £2.2billion last year,” the GMB says.
Better deal: the GMB’s Stacey Booth
Following GMB pressure, the National Joint Council has agreed to meet unions to discuss wages this month – the first time they’ve done so in many years
The GMB’s Stacey Booth said: “Hard-up school support staff are being discriminated against by these term-time only contracts.
“They miss out on more than £4,000 each – every single year.
“The teachers they work with don’t have to put up with it, nor do the council workers they are lumped together with for wages.
“On behalf of GMB’s 100,000 school support staff members, we will demand they get the wages they deserve.”
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