Isis Smyth, Liverpool North Socialist Party
One third of teachers are seeing physical underdevelopment in poorer pupils – this rising to more than half in deprived areas, the results of a recent National Education Union survey found. Many schools are having to help poor families out financially, with kids coming to school hungry and fatigued. 92% of teachers in deprived areas are fatigued, in part from the impact of teaching kids in poverty. 74% of school support staff reported kids having poverty-related poor hygiene. School budgets are stretched thinner and thinner by the day, as the new Labour government continues Tory underfunding. The majority of teachers and support staff pay for food and learning supplies for their pupils out of their own pocket.
This report was published a few weeks after Labour announced cuts to the benefit system. This will only make things worse. 31% of all children in the UK are living in poverty and struggle to attend or focus at school because of this. This includes almost half of UK families with at least one disabled child. With children and their parents facing the removal of PIP and other benefits, many don’t know where to turn.
Labour has shown that it is no longer a party representing the working class. Its priorities lie with the interests of big businesses. Workers, families and children alike are being failed by this government and an increasingly marketised school system. Whilst teaching staff are paying for school supplies and food for pupils out of their own pockets, and children are showing signs of hunger throughout the school day, Labour is funnelling more money into wars. And teachers themselves work long hours and aren’t paid what they deserve.
We need a new mass workers’ party to support trade unions in furthering the rights of workers, and to fight for socialist change to abolish poverty once and for all.
