Education matters

(14/06/10) A busy afternoon at the local government conference in Bournemouth saw delegates agree a number of actions in response to attacks on education.

Moving an emergency motion on academies, head of education Christina McAnea told delegates that the new government was "rushing through a bill to let schools become academies … without consultation."

"Why the rush and why now?" she asked, before saying that the coalition had set aside "£50m to fund legal and stationary costs" of schools applying for academy status. "If they don’t use it all, they don’t have to give it back. It is nothing short of a bribe."

Delegates agreed a raft of actions, including getting the message across to school governors, who can veto a head's decision to apply for academy status, that academy status isn't necessarily a good thing.

Conference also looked at issues around teaching assistants. Not only are many expected to do far more work than they have the time for, there are also problems with them being expected to administer medication to children and even carry out medical procedures – for instance, changing a catheter twice a day.

It was pointed out that, while teachers have refused (rightly) to do such jobs, there was a culture of assuming that support staff would do them, even without training and proper recognition – and members in schools were facing "blackmail" and "bullying" over the issue, explained Frances Lee of the executive.

Susan Kennedy of Aberdeenshire added that "the guilt factor" was being used to make staff undertake such jobs – "in order to show that they care about the children they support."

Delegates instructed the executive to raise the issue with the employers, UK governments and colleagues across other sectors of the union, and to produce clear and ongoing advice for branches and members.

Delegates also agreed to campaign to extend the newly developed School Support Staff Negotiating Body agreement into trust schools and academies, and to help branches and regions to develop training and education for support staff stewards.

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