Britain's two largest teachers' unions have demanded further talks with the government after refusing to sign up to pension reforms.
NASUWT and the National Union of Teachers urged the education secretary, Michael Gove, to change framework proposals drawn up before Christmas. The heads of agreement document established the principles that will underpin a final deal on pension reforms, but such an outcome appears unlikely with both unions demanding further changes.
The move came as the moderate Association of Teachers and Lecturers, which took part in public sector strikes on 30 June and 30 November, warned the NUT and NASUWT that a third wave of walkouts could lead to the imposition of harsher reforms.
Following a meeting of the NASUWT national executive on Friday, the union's general secretary, Chris Keats, said the document was "incomplete" and the product of a rushed negotiation process.
"Unions were pressurised and threatened to sign up to a document when a final draft was not even available," he said. "And even when a document was produced as the final meeting was breaking up, overnight the wording was changed unilaterally by the [Department for Education]."
Keats added that the NASUWT still had concerns over increases in contribution rates and pegging the teachers' pension age to the rising state pension age.
However, the union refrained from calling further strike dates and said it had "reserved its position".
That stance was echoed by the NUT, which called for "urgent discussions" with the Department for Education. "We remain committed to a negotiated agreement on pensions but these proposals will not, in our opinion, serve the interests of teachers or the education system," Christine Blower, the NUT general secretary, said.
"Michael Gove assured us in December that sufficient time and resources would be provided to secure a solution. The government must face the fact that further discussions and additional funding are needed."
The NUT said a meeting of its national executive next Thursday would consider the next step in the anti-reform campaign. However, the ATL, which has signed up to the heads of agreement, warned that calling further strikes could lead to the withdrawal of the proposals and the imposition of tougher changes. Mary Bousted, ATL general secretary, said: "Further prolonged industrial action, which is the only alternative, could lead to the government imposing significantly worse terms than are currently offered."
A DfE spokesman said the framework agreement would not be reopened. The education, health and civil service reforms follow the same outlines – higher contributions; a switch from final salary to career average schemes; moving the uprating of benefits from RPI rate of inflation to the lower CPI rate; and linking the pension age to the state pension age.
"It's disappointing the NUT and NASUWT restated their position on last month's deal," the spokesman said. "We've already addressed many of teachers' concerns, particularly around early retirement.
"We are now ready to have detailed, technical discussions to reach a final settlement, but have made clear that the broad deal on the table is as good as it gets."
Referring to the Association of Teachers and Lecturers and the National Association of Head Teachers, he added: "Other unions have given a far more positive response and will be consulting with their executives later this month."
Both the NUT and NASUWT took part in the 30 November public sector walkouts. NASUWT has 280,000 members and the NUT 308,000.
On Thursday, the Unite trade union rejected the government's proposals on reforms to health pensions.
The main player in those negotiations, Unison, will decide its stance next week. The government is seeking reforms to four public sector pension schemes – health, education, civil service and local government.
Meanwhile, trade union activists will urge the TUC to set a date for another day of strike action at a conference on Saturday.
Mark Serwotka, the general secretary of the largest civil servants' union, the Public and Commercial Services Union, will attend a meeting of the PCS socialist group along with the Labour MP John McDonnell.
More than 1 million public sector workers took part in TUC-coordinated walkouts on 30 November, with around 27 unions taking part.
Comments
6 January 2012 3:31PM
Orville won't be pleased. That nappy is going to need changing again.
6 January 2012 3:36PM
I for one wouldn't want to see teachers carrying on teaching into their late 60's and to be honest I can't see there is much saving to be made because for every extra year you make them work, they are entitled to another 1/80th (or whatever) of salary i.e. you delay paying them but have to pay them more.
6 January 2012 3:45PM
Not to mention throttling entry into the profession. There's a distinct lack of lateral thinking at play here.
6 January 2012 3:49PM
Government need to stick to their guns....the offer on the table is already far too generous.
The country is being held to ransom yet again by left wing union barons and need to be shown whose boss.
Bob Crow on the news today (God how thick does this guy sound!!) pressing for HS2 to be built without further delay. Ok go ahead as planned but require the unions to sign up to a 10 year no strike deal first....if the unions want something the government should get something in return.
6 January 2012 3:50PM
As a reactionary old right-winger, I find myself in sympathy with the teachers and the other unions. Capitalism only functions where contracts are honoured. Employees are recruited on the basis of an agreed contract of employment, the pension deal forming part of that contract and, as such, it can only be altered with the consent of both parties.
The present government are trying to betray the decent Conservative principles and cheat working people out of their hard-earned pensions. Cameron will never get my vote.
6 January 2012 3:51PM
My own union, UCU, won't be far behind in rejecting this poisonous deal. The biggest unions, whose leaders have the closest ties to Labour, should realize their members should realize their members by a huge majority demand action and a fair settlement -- if Unions and GMB won't provide a fighting strategy, their members will leave for unions that will.
6 January 2012 3:57PM
The Tories continue to attack the unions whilst at the same time letting corporations get away with millions and millions of unpaid taxation.
Where is the justice in that. A good many teachers already retire early anyway
due to stress.
6 January 2012 4:27PM
Left wing union barons? You are either way past retiring age or a troll which has resurfaced from Xmas for a bit of stirring with the wooden spoon.
Anyone who has anything to do with teachers would know you could not imagine a more reactionary bunch, hesitant to change yet certainly not stupid enough to sign up to an ill-considered pensions deal designed to get the govt out of the s..t brought about by brutally austere policy planning and implementation. Like all bullies, Cameron is trying to find the easiest targets to pay for his stupidity. He has already targeted the disabled, told nurses to be kinder and yet again rubbished teachers with the usual kind of black propaganda shown in the Times today.
His spin merchants must be working double time to extract him from the mire.
Why should any group of people just lie down and accept what the govt has to offer? We most certainly are not all in this together.
Cue another moronic catchphrase from the troll spinsters.
6 January 2012 4:28PM
Good for the teaching unions!
@uptheprivatesector - up your's!
6 January 2012 4:28PM
Decent conservative principles vanished with Harold Macmillan my friend.
6 January 2012 4:29PM
As a social worker in a local authority i fully support the rejection of this deal. This year both me and my wife have each had £1200 essential car user allowance cut, she has had a pay cut of £2000, I have not had a pay rise for three years and am not likely to get one any time soon. Between us we will both have to pay an extra £200per month into the pension schemes meaning that as a family we will have lost approx £7000 each year. We have two small children and a mortgage to pay.
The pension deal is just a part of what we are fighting for, we lead a frugal life and did not contribute to the current economic situation, so why should we pay for other peoples failures. I support the idea of the country sticking together, but only when we all share the same pain.
My main difficulty will now be that Unison are likely to accept this offer because the lowest paid will be less affected, while we "the squeezed middle (apparently)" get shafted from all ways. If Unison accept the offer then there will be no point in my wife working because the child care costs along with the further lost income will mean that there is no longer a financial point to working. The government will then lose her tax and the local authority a dedicated experienced worker.
6 January 2012 4:34PM
Mark Serwotka maintains the long tradition of loony left PCS leaders desperate for a politically motivated scrap. Most of his members will maintain the long tradition of refusing to be cannon fodder in that battle.
6 January 2012 4:34PM
Good stuff, looks like we are on a roll.....
Start planning strike days during the Olympics, that's what I say.
Style of thing
6 January 2012 4:35PM
"Decent conservative principles vanished with Harold Macmillan my friend."
So do you not consider my support for the unions on this issue to be an example of "decent Conservative principles"?
There are good and decent values in all of the non-extreme political philosophies but, as Orwell recognised, all too often they are corrupted by the unprincipled and self-interested.
6 January 2012 4:36PM
Teachers have just had 2 weeks off for Christmas. You can't be that tired you need a break already. Oh, and making poor people take a day off work to look after the kids while you tell everyone how hard you have it is a little immoral
6 January 2012 4:38PM
Ever wonder why Unions are so unpopular?
6 January 2012 4:48PM
Fine, lets all refuse to pay our taxes to pay for their pensions....Private sector workers need the money for their own pensions.
These people think they are immune to the world and everyone should make sacrifices but them...Even with the changes that are massively better off. The average teacher will have a pension pot of 600k. The average private sector worker will be lucky to scrape 150k.
Any who else gets lovely LONG holidays
6 January 2012 4:52PM
@Pavis
Hmmm....there's a lesson in there somewhere, pavis - you should stand up for yourself and stop bloodywell condemning those that do.
6 January 2012 4:55PM
I don't wonder.
I know.
Style of thing
6 January 2012 4:57PM
@imageark - I'm sure plopped knows too, really. You do take the Mail, don't you, Plopped?
6 January 2012 4:58PM
Any more debts you think the State should renege on? If your company was owed money by a public body for work performed and/or goods supplied, and the government decided not to pay up as agreed, and you were laid off because of that, would that be OK?
The "average teacher" entered the profession on an agreed deal being freely offered at the time. The government needed teachers and didn't want to pay them as much as many could have earned elsewhere, so they promised them "jam tomorrow" in the form of a fully guaranteed, copper-bottomed pension deal. Now the current government is cynically trying to evade that debt.
I don't blame the teachers, and other public sector workers, for taking action. If I were in their shoes, I would do the same.
6 January 2012 5:05PM
@EvilMcBad
I don't get why people get on their high horse about the Mail. The Guardian is exactly the same just in the opposite direction, which makes it a bit of rubbish insult
6 January 2012 5:27PM
@Plopped
Errr - No, the Guardian isn't remotely like the Mail. The Mail is a rabid rag whose main purpose is to inflame the righteously indignant right wing simpletons. The Guardian - whilst not always right - at least maintains a sense of proportion.
6 January 2012 5:33PM
@ plopped - I meant to add that I can, however, see why you don't get it.
6 January 2012 5:37PM
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6 January 2012 5:47PM
oooooh - you Mailistas! You're SOOOOO sharp!
6 January 2012 5:52PM
@ Plopped
Mail and Guardian " the same just in the opposite direction?"
Oh dear.
6 January 2012 5:57PM
Good! They have a contract. A Contract of employment. A Part of which covers their pension entitlement!
I have no objection to new employees starting their careers on a different contract reflecting the current situation and revised contract. A deal is a deal. Something to do with integrity.
You cant have it both ways. We have captains of industry and members of the banking fraternity who have destroyed not only their organisation but the world economy and they still walk away with billions in bonus!
If we are so hard up let us see leadership from the MP's foregoing their settlement at the end of term and foregoing their pensions.
6 January 2012 6:15PM
@EvilMcBad and biglampbitter
The Mail stirs the right-wing; the Guardian stirs the left wing. Failing to see this is very strange. For example, a story yesterday had the headline "Millions use payday loans to cover mortgage and rental costs." This is wrong as less than a million use payday loans. This story was generated to prove to us all how bad the economy is.
Stories about Cameron and Clegg's working partnership stating how bad things are were wrong. The piece of research actually said that the partnership was working very well and much better than Blair and Brown's ever was. Again this was a story to whip up anti-coalition sentiment.
As with the comments. There are many that can be used as examples of hatred without thought. People calling for riots for example. Then there is the complete inability to criticise a Union or Labour member no matter what they have done.
You can look on the Mail and find very similar things. Not better, not worse, just different. Just because you disagree with them doesn't make them worse.
Then there is the "simpletons" and the "You're SOOOOO sharp!" remarks. Well done for those, cracking repartee! I'm guessing you don't like debate
6 January 2012 6:17PM
Teachers get plenty of time off!
If they have to work longer to get a pension, seems only fair considering all their holidays!
What happens if they strike?
Kids will miss a few days school?
Kids these days can't even do simple maths, don't think missing a few days school is going to make much difference, can it get any worse?
6 January 2012 6:33PM
But a contract should be legally binding - changes only can made if both parties agree. You wouldn't accept your mortgage term or loan total being changed just because the building society wasn't doing well financially, and i'm sure they would not agree to myself changing the terms of the loan just to suit myself either.
6 January 2012 7:23PM
" A Contract should be legally binding - both parties agree"
Ha ha ha ho ho ha !
Summer anthem.
Re - released cover or this original
Style of thing
6 January 2012 7:44PM
Pensions aren't a contract, they are a benefit - like childcare vouchers. Benefits are introduced, improved, reduced or withdrawn all the time. Provided that any pension already earned hasn't been affected, then there is no breach of contract.
Personally, I would move the Public Sector pensions over from being defined benefit, to being defined contribution. That way there would be a clear comparison for everyone to see between the Private Sector and the State Sector.
6 January 2012 8:30PM
“In Germany they came first for the Communists, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Communist. Then they came for the Jews, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Jew. Then they came for the trade unionists, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a trade unionist. Then they came for the Catholics, and I didn't speak up because I was a Protestant. Then they came for me, and by that time no one was left to speak up.”
― Martin Niemöller
Public sector or private sector, we are all going to get screwed over by this government eventually. Unions and strike action are vital ways of maintaining workers rights. Stop criticising each others jobs when you don't actually DO that job peacefr0g! Evcerybody who works is a vital member of society regardlessof what their job is, teacher, nurse, bin man, private sector worker this government is deliberately trying to mdrive a wedge between public and private sector workers. Don't let them!
6 January 2012 8:46PM
Do you enjoy weekends? Or time off from work?
Do you have the INTELLIGENCE to understand why you are bestowed such privileges?
As for your comments about Mr Crow. Is it class prejudice or are you some popinjay upstart?
You sound like a columnist for that anti working class down market ruling class propaganda sheet tabloid The Scum, even though the lumpen proletariat are fooled into buying it.
We are watching the biggest robbery in the history of man. And it's not just pensions here that are at stake. It's a whole load of other fundamental rights that are being eroded. You won't be bleating the misinformed yes sir yes sir three bags full blarb on here when you suddenly realise we have the social and labour benefits of a your typical Chinese or Vietnamese worker.
Think about where all the cash has gone. And it certainly wasn't Labour impropriety as this lot of gangsters would have you believe even though Liebour are very much part of the problem. Robin Hood has been in reverse for at least thirty years and this is just the next card in that sordid expropriation of our collective wealth.
Chicago School all the way.
6 January 2012 9:15PM
Apologies this paragraph should read (note the bold)...
6 January 2012 9:37PM
As someone facing a large tax bill at the end of this month, I must say that i find the moaning about pensions to be sickening. I am self employed. I cannot afford to purchase a pension as my tax bill is so large. My children went to private school so I did not even use the public sector for education despite paying for it. And all I hear is whining by public sector workers who get paid holidays (I don't as if I don't work, I don't earn); they have security of employment (I don't); maternity/paternity leave (I don't); a five day week (I don't; I work seven days a week for 12 hours per day); a pension (I dont); sick pay if they are off (not me). And, if you are a teacher, you get massive holidays all paid for and a 9-4 day? On the day of the strike, I had to fight my way to work along the streets of London to earn money, paying over half of it in tax and NI to pay for other people's pensions who were inhibiting me getting to work. If teachers want to be treated like professionals, they should act like them. Preparation for classes comes with the job. What other professional expects to turn up for work without having prepared? Doctors? Lawyers? Accountants? Nurses? I doubt it very much. The tax rates in this country are outrageous and a total disincentive to working here. I did not think I would be going in to a 50/50 partnership with HMGovt. Especially when my tax is used to pay for pensions to allow teachers to retire 20 odd years before their anticipated date of death. I guess I will just have to work on until I die, so I can keep them in clover. Work longer; work harder; face up to it. It is not fair to expect others to work on to allow you to sit and watch daytime TV.
6 January 2012 9:39PM
The anti-union stories the Mail produces on an almost daily basis are laughable.
My favourites include:
Public services unions plan to strike on the Royal Wedding Day, implying they wished to spoil the wedding of Kate Middleton and that Prince chappie - no such strike was ever planned or took place.
Teachers want to ban Christmas - the headline that tried to explain that the NASUWT's industrial action short of strike action would cancel Nativity plays and end of term Xmas celebrations. I dont know of any school where such action took place.
The Graun occasionally get it wrong and they usually apologise for this.
They dont tell outright porkie pies.
6 January 2012 9:52PM
Spare us the sob story, if you were that hard up your children wouldn't be in private school.
Most self employed people I have ever met have a hundred and one ways to reduce their tax bill compared to those on PAYE. Before you slag off the teachers you need to spend a few days 'walking in their shoes'
Got stuck in the demo? - tough luck mate. The British people aren't about to give up a right of protest because it has made you delayed.
6 January 2012 10:27PM
More fool you.
You could always get a public sector job if it's so wonderful.
Money grows on trees and the streets are paved with gold. You know there is a pot of gold at the end of every rainbow. Have you had a look?
By the way, is this a p**s take?
Did you have to crawl over broken glass to get to work?
You're right they just wing it. They're too busy down the pub on an evening swigging gin through their eyeballs.
You could always emigrate or become a teacher with amazing work related benefits and a gold plated pension - but looking at how stressed out you are you probably wouldn't cut the mustard in a classroom setting. Also if you are paying that much tax well you're earning a lot more than any teacher I know. However, I suggest you go on the dole and become a scrounger because you feel so hard done by. It's a great life. Rent paid and free money which you can live the high life. Caviare and champers everyday and enough money to go to have a flutter at Ladbrokes on an afternoon.
Did you cut and paste that from the letters page of the Daily Mail? Or is it a case that you are so mortgage and debt afflicted because you've mad some very bad choices.
Private school for your kids is a big waste unless you can afford to send them to Eaton or Rugby and have the network contacts when they leave. It's a bit like a new car (I've bet you've bought a few of those) they depreciate very rapidly and are not worth the money.
So it's a case of lashing out at other members of your class and blaming them for your misfortune even though they are in a very similar position to you financially and are as in fact as vulnerable as you. Instead of standing with them as they stand up for their rights you join in with the cheap snipes delved out by the greedy gangsters who run this country and the gutter press. You fail to look at who the real parasites and thieves are because you have bought their shallow propaganda - hook, line and sinker.
7 January 2012 9:36AM
spudfacenipper:
i) If the deal in the public sector is so good please do come and join us. There are vacancies aplenty for teachers,geriatric/mental health nurses and social workers.
ii) I have no children and I am unmarried but I pay tax for child allowance and a whole host of other provisions targeted at families that I will not directly benefit from. Who knows you may even benefit from some of those payments? My tax also covers the charity allowances that many private schools get. Sorry but we all pay taxation for somethings we do not benefit from.
iii) If you think a teacher does a 9 to 4 day and does not work for considerable parts of their holiday you know "Sweet Felicity Arkwright" about education. I am sure you work really hard - please do not though insult those in the public sector by implying that many of them do not.
On a more positive note nuisverige thanks for restoring my faith that there are some on the right who understand the notion of fulfilling contracts/commitments. Personally I hope a negotiated settlement can be reached but the manner in which the government has handled this matter has been bullish and inept. To get ATL and the NAHT to strike when they have never done so before rather shoots a hole in the argument of some that this dispute is one of the loony left. When some independent school teachers and mild mannered headteachers take industrial action this government has manged to agitate conservatives with both a small, and in some cases, large C. That really takes the highest level of ineptness at a ministerial level.
7 January 2012 11:30AM
What is the labour parties view on this? Can't hear them.
7 January 2012 4:25PM
So why did I send my kids to private school? Because the education they got there was far superior to the overpopulated classes in state school. I don't regret doing it at all. Incidentally, as the benefits to employees in private schools are much better - and they are - why do the public sector whiners not get a job there??? I guess it is that they are simply not the best of the bunch.
Why would I not join the public sector? First and foremost because I was brought up to realise that I am not owed a living by the state. If I work, I get paid. Unlike those who not only expect, but demand that they be carried by others.
Second, in the business I am in, the work in there is no public sector employment. I am certain that the amount of work expected of me in my profession would not be tolerated by those in the public sector.
The public sector is broadly to keep a large number of people who are otherwise unemployable off the dole queues.
In the tirade of abuse above - oh yes, must be teachers who are rather touchy when facing the truth - no one takes on board the point about job security and other benefits.
I get on with my life; I pay my tax; I have never moaned about that until I hear the constant whinge about "my pension is being eroded" and "I will have to work longer, pay more and get less". Welcome to the world I have been living in for all my working life!!! Go on, have another strike. Apart from a big crowd in London, who all seemed to disappear to do some early Xmas shopping frankly, I hardly noticed the difference in the service provided to me. In fact, the more strikes there are the better. It will make it clear to the public generally what a poor "service" we get from public services. And yes, I would like to leave this country and believe me I would if I could.
However, I have certain obligations to my clients, my children, my family. But I guess that loyalty and obligation are alien to those who are sympathetic to those who strike. Anyway, despite it being Saturday evening I had better get back to work. Unlike the teachers I had at school who did actually "wing" it most of the time. Try getting one of your kids to ask them a question that is not on the syllabus and they are totally thrown by it. Guess they were down the pub....
7 January 2012 5:15PM
Oh, and incidentally, Torywatch: I presume you are not a teacher (It's Eton, not Eaton; I assume you mean "made" rather than "mad" bad choices. See me later.)
I don't have a car. I cannot afford one actually. I do have a bike that I use to cycle to work on. I suppose you will tell me what the depreciation is on a bike too?
You also have absolutely no idea what I do for a living and no idea what stresses come with the job. To stand in front of a class of kids, parroting out to them the scripts provided by the state, seems like a breeze to me frankly. Rather like Woody Allen ("I know a lot about kids. I used to be one") I was indeed once at school. I know what it was like and I know what the teachers were like.
Yes, I earn a lot more than most if not all teachers. But I can tell you this: I spent eight years training including two years without any pay; I worked seven days a week for ten years; and now I get a day off a week if I am lucky. Maybe if I divided up my salary by about 310 days and by the ten hours a day i work it would be much the same as a teacher's salary on a daily basis or hour to hour. But as I said, I don't get paid for three weeks holiday at Xmas and Easter, all the public holidays, the eight weeks in the summer etc etc.
Stress? You have got to be kidding!! And no, I don't read the Daily Mail. I can think for myself, unlike those who do what the Union tells them. It was but a minor inconvenience getting to my work but as I say, by all reports the boost to the economy with the strikers taking the opportunity to call in at the High Street shops for their early Xmas shopping was worth the inconvenience to me.
I also do a large amount of free work for those in need and on many occasions have been the only port of call for them. If I am to start cutting work, they too will suffer. But hey, when did a teacher last do some work for nothing?
Keep whining. The more you do, the less the hard working people of this country will consider you worthy of being listened to. I gave up a long, long time ago.
7 January 2012 7:42PM
@spudfacenipper syllabuses ("syllabi", of course, being the latin plural, but in english "syllabuses" is perfectly acceptable) are necessary in fact because most teachers have a knowledge base considerably broader than necessary to deliver their subject. the syllabus (or specification, as i understand most british exam boards now call them) ensures that teachers know which parts of that knowledge/skill base must be passed on to be of most benefit to the learners when exam time rolls around. of course this is not to say that teachers will be able to answer every question, but most that i know find questions (especially ones they have to do a bit of research for) very stimulating and are delighted to answer "i don't know but i'll find out for you" when necessary - apart from anything else, this is a good model for lifelong learning. it seems a shame you had such bad teachers; i've had a lot of contact with many schools, most teachers i meet now are highly motivated subject experts with a strong interest in helping and developing our young people.
7 January 2012 7:43PM
spudfacenipper - you can't be more incorrect if you tried! I'm a teacher and I work from 8:30 - 6 pm daily, once the students have left I have to plan lessons, attend meetings and get resources for the next day. I often do work on Sundays and I can only use up my holiday when the students are off which is when all the prices are hiked up making it expensive if I actually manage to save up. I work in an office and only my line manager has a full time position the rest of us are either term time only or 1 year contracts leaving us with no job security!!
Ontop of this you stated your tax bracket which was 50% which means u earn over 150k a year, that's a lot of money no wonder you can afford to send your children to private schools and can easily afford to pay into a private pension scheme a lot more than I contribute to my public one
7 January 2012 9:45PM
@spudfacenipper
7 January 2012 05:15PM
Rattled are we Spuddy. Thanks for correcting my spelling. I was wearing beer goggles not that that is a worthy excuse. Nonetheless, it reflects the spiteful shallow and petty individual you are especially after reading your previous post and how weak, self centred and spurious your arguments are.
Depends on the bike. But really how is it plausible you cannot afford a car because you contradict yourself later in your post.
Your verbatim really expresses that with insincere glee but like the rest of your post it is not convincing. You earn more than teachers but you really can't afford a car but you sent or send your kids to some poxy private school.
Your dyslexicon continues
Are you a university professor, doctor/consultant or master engineer??? I think not.
I grew up with a rusty spoon in my mouth and all I got for xmas was a lump of coal.
Diddums...but what you fail to mention is that teachers actually end up working a lot of those supposed benefits. It's a vocation not a jolly.
Are you sure? Reading between the lines and that earlier post. Most people are in denial about such things. Would you like me to recommend a therapist?
Again. Are you sure? It seems like you cannot go from one sentence to the next without contradicting yourself or making some faux pas. Did you have a private education? A waste of money wasn't it?
Yes and Unions are so undemocratic in their structure and the way they preach to their members. It reminds me of Germany in the 1930s. It amazes me how they brainwash their members and get them to pay subs. It must be that communist propaganda sheet the Morning Star which has a mighty circulation of about 20,000 which I suspect you don't read.
Not the way you made it sound yesterday. That's why I asked you if you'd had to crawl over broken glass.
I hope you be saying the same when public sector workers don't receive such massive cuts to their pensions, which ultimately will reduce welfare dependency and future benefit social costs. It may also keep the spending power of the grey pound buoyant so that long term economic sustainability can be achieved, instead of short term fix to gain the confidence of predatory bond markets and very wealthy people who reside in the Cayman Islands.
Are you sure you have time? I thought worked 10 hours a day 310 days a year. Your amazing. Do you wear a cape, have wings or live on a cloud?
Here's your previous post. I suggest you read it. Is that whining I hear? Really who really wants to read and listen to such tortuous drivel. At least we can agree on something. Anyway, please check my spelling. I know my grammar and command of the English Language is much better than yours - and I went to one of those overcrowded bog standard state ran comprehensive schools.
7 January 2012 9:58PM
I hadn't read this earlier. This is just nuts.
Misinformed bigoted drivel. God help your kids and your family.
You must be a really nice person. Level headed and a pleasure to be in the company of.
What is it that you do? I hope you don't work with anybody that is vulnerable.
7 January 2012 11:02PM
For the record. I went to an overcrowded comprehensive state school. The teachers were at best adequate, although a few were utterly hopeless.
Yes, my training did take that long. I know it is hard to believe.... but you know there are people out there who have harder training than teachers, and more stressful jobs. I realise that teachers like to wallow in the feeling that they are professionals, hard done by, stressed out and the rest of the world owes them a pension and a job. But if they were truly working in a meritocracy, many of them would be unemployed.
So where does my money go? School fees; University fees for my kids; tax to pay for public sector workers. And how many of those who can't stand the truth and snipe at me will be able to claim that they carry out significant amounts of professional time without payment? As I said, I do. Regularly.
Any time that teachers are threatened with performance related pay regulation, they just about faint. They hate league tables, which will flush out the useless and the incompetent. Perhaps assessment of pensions should depend upon the exam results that their pupils ultimately obtain compared with the average for their socio economic areas. If they are in the bottom 10 percentile, they only get 10% of their pension. That would work!!
The reason I earn so much is that I work hard; I am good at my job; people come to me to have me work for them; I get results. I don't depend on others to support me and I don't have or require a union that pays fat salaries to pseudo socialists.
Yes, I am whining now. But I only started after I became utterly fed up with moaning of teachers and other public sector workers of late.
If the job is so stressful, so poorly paid, such long hours, such a bad pension, why not leave it and get a better job??? The answer is that those complaints are weasel words. The job is easy, well paid, secure and the pension is brilliant compared to anything that can be bought on the open market. The clients I have, including those I work for without charging are all in serious difficulty. I have even worked for teachers, free of charge, who have been immensely grateful for what I have done for them. So I don't have to take lectures from people about being overpaid. I could easily teach and I know for a fact there is no way any teacher could do what I do without a lengthy period of re education. I also get paid what the market will pay me: not some union negotiated pay scale that allows the useless to benefit from standard wage payments. The general teaching council has now started de registering incompetent teachers. Long may that continue.....
8 January 2012 12:02AM
I don't actually believe you do anything. After your previous posts it amazes me that you actually have the time to write such convoluted drivel on CiF. You love talking about yourself and belittling others but have yet to write anything convincing nor have you actually said what you do.
Let's face it. You are a bigot. You posts snipe at public sector workers like some nasty greedy divisive nutjob neocon instead of recognising that all workers are being attacked on all levels in both the public and private sector. You ignore the predatory and structural forces that are sustaining these attacks on workers and prefer to bleat a self centred diatribe about how hard done by you are and how wonderful you are. If you are so altruistic as you profess - you've worked for teachers free of charge (like shit you have - another lie along with the rest) - you will understand that all workers deserve a decent pensions and have a right to withhold their labour in doing so.
I would love to see you teach. You think it's so easy. Well reading your contradictory and incoherent drivel I think you would be one of those incompetents that you refer to with such disdainful glee. It seems you forget from one sentence to the next what you have written.
Frankly I don't believe the bilge you've written about yourself, you are not genuine and I'm sure plenty of others would agree. Are you a meathead swigging brown liquor , having delusions in-between slapping the wife and kids about or a Tory plant?