Socialists re-elected unopposed to NEU executive

Vote Sean McCauley and Dan Warrington to join them

Socialist Party members Sheila Caffrey and Louise Cuffaro have been re-elected unopposed to the National Executive of the National Education Union.

Since 2021, Sheila and Louise have fought for national action, for the leadership of the union to stand up to Starmer’s Labour government, and against ‘partnership’ with the government and employers.

In the elections that begin on 1 April, two other Socialist Party members are up for election, Sean McCauley in District 8 and Dan Warrington in District 11.

Sean McCauley, Worcestershire NEU district secretary,  personal capacity, and candidate for National Executive

As National Education Union (NEU) members gear up for the elections to the National Executive, reports abound of “the worst squeeze in a generation”, including in schools, in the Labour government’s Spring Statement.

We need to get ready for a massive fight – and we need a leadership prepared to lead it! 

Eight historic days of strike action in 2023 taken by NEU teachers won not just once but twice on pay: 6.5% in September 2023 and, through the mere threat of further strike action against the new Starmer-led and austerity-driven government, 5.5% in September 2024.

Most crucially for our members, we won some of the funding to go with it: £2 billion across the two years, in addition to the £1.2 billion the Tories gave in 2022. Not enough to cover the full cost, which now means that schools are restructuring and making redundancies, in particular amongst our lowest-paid support staff members.

Socialist Party NEU members warned at the time that the national fight on funding was not over, but the NEU leadership settled and refused to lead a further campaign.

National campaign

Local disputes against redundancies and restructuring, as well as threats to pensions, terms and conditions and bullying management, are winning gains in more schools and colleges than ever before. The national leadership, though, would prefer to keep the fight on these issues to local disputes rather than leading a national fight, which would win for all our members. But Labour’s potential cuts make it clear – a national fightback is needed.

Currently NEU is running an indicative national ballot on the dismal 2.8% September 2025 pay offer, to be funded through ‘efficiencies’ i.e. further cuts. Winning the funding is the most important aspect of the fight for members, but they also want the issue to be widened out to include demands on overall funding for education, not just for pay awards, in particular for Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND). For example, in Worcestershire the SEND budget is £42 million in deficit; if this debt were not bankrolled by the government the county council would have been forced to issue a Section 114 ‘bankruptcy’ notice years ago.

Workload

The funding crisis also has a massive impact on workload, as fewer teachers and support staff shoulder more responsibilities and class sizes rise. Members want a national fight on workload, a fight to win a new National Contract for all education workers, including supply staff, that sets firm limits on the hours we can be expected to work by management.

Workload and the funding crisis directly affect support staff too, and Socialist Party members are continuing to call for support staff to be included in this fight, which the current leadership is not prepared to do.

We need more people on the executive who will also push for a stronger and clearer message about the need to reverse academisation (see ‘Fight for academies to return to local authority control’ below).

Socialist Party NEU members also oppose the partnership deal which the leadership has signed with the government and employers. We are not partners with those who want to make massive cuts and privatise education!

Bold lead

As was shown at times in 2023, when the NEU leadership is prepared to give a bold lead from the front whilst mobilising the full weight of the entire union – increasing membership and rep numbers, building the confidence of local officers, uniting teachers and support staff – we can win.

But this would not have happened without the active campaigning of Socialist Party members from 2021, who were instrumental in convincing the leadership we could win national ballots for action; the prevailing mood at the top of the union at the time was that the 2016 Trade Union Act ballot thresholds would prevent us ever winning one again.

The elections for NEU National Executive run from 1 -29 April.

The fight for a serious lead from the top of the union will be greatly strengthened if we get two additional Socialist Party members elected to join Sheila Caffrey and Louise Cuffaro.

• Sean McCauley District 8: Glos, Heref, Oxon, Sth Glos, Swindon, Warks, Wilts, Worcs
• Dan Warrington District 11: Bracknell Forest, IoW, NE Hants, Portsmouth, Reading, Slough, SE Hants, Southampton, Surrey, W Berks, W Hants, Windsor & Maidenhead, Wokingham

Fight for academies to return to local authority control

James Ellis, NEU lead rep

The National Education Union (NEU) in Hastings organised a demonstration on Saturday 22 March calling for eight schools to be brought back under local authority control.

A campaign against cuts, including strike action, has succeeded in forcing out The University of Brighton Academies Trust (UBAT).

UBAT was taking an average of 14% of school budgets, and in some cases up to 25%, to pay for its central team. It was spending nearly £1 million on marketing.

But we don’t want to just be shunted into another academy chain! The long-term solution for our schools does not lie with any specific academy trust. Academies lack local accountability, spend huge amounts of public money on their central teams and executive pay, and treat education like a business. Our members are all too aware that there are many more ‘UBATs’ out there that haven’t yet been exposed.

The NEU wants all schools to return to local authority control, and for the government to properly fund local councils to allow them to provide the kind of education services that our students deserve. We want the wider school community, including all unions, to be included in the discussions about the future direction of these schools.

The NEU in Hastings is calling on our MP to move an amendment to Labour’s Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill currently going through parliament to allow a route for academy schools to be returned to local authority control.

We urge other NEU districts to write to their local MPs asking that they put forward such an amendment.