Teachers in 32 sixth form colleges have voted to take strike action after the government snubbed them from this year’s school teacher pay award.
Union leaders have not, however, put forward dates for picket lines as they seek “urgent clarification” from the government on whether the £300 million announced at the budget should be spent on pay.
Members of the National Education Union (NEU), which represents 2,500 sixth form college teachers and negotiates their pay as part of the national joint council with the Sixth Form College Association (SFCA), ran a strike ballot from September 14 to November 7.
The summer announcement to award a 5.5 per cent pay rise to school teachers in 2024/25 came with £1.2 billion to go towards the cost of teacher and support staff pay rises, which was accessible to schools and sixth form colleges that have converted to academy status.
But ministers decided to offer no funding for pay to the 40 sixth form colleges that have decided to not academise, leaving those colleges to awards pay rises from their own funds.
Chancellor Rachel Reeves did announce an additional £300 million for FE in last month’s budget, but the Department for Education is yet to say how this funding will be distributed or how it can be used.
The Sixth Form College Association last week said that “most” of the £300 million will be “needed to fund the projected increase in the number of students” instead of staff pay.
The NEU has not confirmed whether strike action will actually go ahead.
NEU general secretary Daniel Kebede said today that the £300 million “should properly be spent on staff pay and we are seeking urgent clarification from the DfE that they will confirm that colleges may do so”.
An NEU spokesperson added: “We have written to the education secretary to schedule an urgent meeting to discuss the decision by government to offer an above-inflation pay award to some sixth form colleges and not others. We hope that a successful resolution will be met.
“Should there be no successful outcome the NEU has a strong mandate for strike action. No member wants to be taking strike action but if we are left with no other option a timetable for action will be outlined in due course.”
Risk of a ‘two-tier workforce’
The union’s strike ballot was sent to 40 non-academised colleges. Blackpool sixth form college was later withdrawn as it became an academy after the ballot went out. Out of a 62 per cent turnout, 97 per cent voted in favour of strike action.
Kebede said the government’s “baffling decision” to award the pay rise to some sixth form colleges and not others undermines the sixth form college sector’s national collective bargaining arrangement and “risks the creation of a two-tier workforce”.
“We have been disappointed by the failure of the government to resolve this frankly unnecessary dispute, particularly when we have taken every step to explain the distinctive nature of sixth form colleges relative to the schools sector, and the importance of maintaining the integrity of existing collective bargaining arrangements,” he said.
“NEU sixth form college teachers have shown that they will fight for a fair pay award for all colleges.”
Graham Baird, director of HR services at the SFCA, said: “We agree with the NEU that the government’s decision to exclude sixth form colleges from the funding to increase staff pay is baffling. We also agree that this decision undermines our highly effective system of collective pay bargaining.
“However, we cannot condone strike action being taken in sixth form colleges and we will continue to urge the government to avoid this action by providing the additional funding required to match the pay award made to staff in schools.”
The 32 sixth form colleges that voted in favour of strike:
Aquinas College (Stockport)
Barton Peveril Sixth Form College (Eastleigh)
Bolton Sixth Form College
Brighton Hove and Sussex Sixth Form College
Cardinal Newman College (Preston)
Christ The King Sixth Form College (Lewisham)
Christ The King Sixth Form College Aquinas
Capital City College – Angel (Islington)
Greenhead College (Huddersfield)
Henley College
Hills Road Sixth Form College (Cambridge)
Holy Cross College (Bury)
Itchen College (Southampton)
Joseph Chamberlain Sixth Form College (Birmingham)
Leyton Sixth Form College
Loreto College (Manchester)
Luton Sixth Form College
Notre Dame Catholic Sixth Form College (Leeds)
Peter Symonds College (Winchester)
Richard Collyer, The College of (Horsham)
Scarborough Sixth Form College
Shrewsbury Colleges Group
Sir George Monoux College (Walthamstow)
St Brendan’s Sixth Form College (Bristol)
St Charles Catholic Sixth Form College (Kensington)
St Francis Xavier Sixth Form College (Clapham)
St John Rigby RC Sixth Form College (Wigan)
Varndean College (Brighton)
Wilberforce College (Hull)
Winstanley College (Wigan)
WQE and Regent College Group (Leicester)
Wyke Sixth Form College
Xaverian College (Manchester)
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