Feature
The fight for a fair deal As support staff bear the brunt of squeezed budgets, Sally Gillen reports on job creep and grade drift, as an NEU survey shows the extent of the problem. WHEN teaching assistants at one school began regularly covering lessons because of Covid-related absence, the head and finance manager agreed to pay them more – but just £5 per lesson. For one NEU member, this amounted to £105 for 21 hours, a paltry “top up” received many months later. Just one example of the way in which support staff are being exploited. This army of staff who have kept schools going throughout the pandemic have had more and more dumped on them for little or nothing in return. That is the story told by findings from the union’s annual support staff survey. It was completed by more than a thousand members including teaching assistants, administrators, safeguarding leads, librarians, technicians and premises officers. And it shows the pre-pandemic problems affecting support staff – “job creep” and “grade drift” – have become worse over the past two years. HLTAs teaching to timetable The survey found 48 per cent of higher-level teaching assistants (HLTAs) are now teaching regularly, with more than a third (36 per cent) timetabled by their school to teach on a permanent basis. Almost three quarters (74 per cent) of cover supervisors are delivering lessons when they should be merely supervising. As one member told us: “The class teacher has not been vaccinated, so whenever there is a case in class, she has to isolate for ten days and teach on Teams, while I look after the class including my 1:1 child.” A learning support assistant (LSA) and NEU rep at a secondary in the north of England feels managers have been targeting her over the last year. As a rep, she has regularly said no to unreasonable demands.
When, as a level 2 employee, she was given a full-time intervention timetable, she queried the decision. “I had to fight that and thank goodness I had a clause in my contract that says my duties must be ‘commensurate with the grade’. It allowed me to push back against the additional workload.”
“Be positive about your job and keep the tone factual. Just go and have a conversation and you might get lucky. ” Angela Raven (above)
‘Flexible’ contracts lead to job creep However, a group of new teaching assistants employed during the pandemic are on a different contract – without this clause – leaving them unprotected from job creep and grade drift. Instead, they have a flexibility clause, allowing managers the freedom to add to their duties as and when they choose. It reads: “These duties are neither exclusive nor exhaustive and the post holder will be required to undertake other duties and responsibilities which the head teacher/line manager may determine.” The rep argues that one of the things the NEU should be campaigning for is a clause in teaching assistant contracts that protects them from having extra tasks given to them, which are beyond their pay grade. In her five years at the school, there have been three head teachers, all in their first headship. “You find that, as a new head joins, and in an effort to make their mark, you get more and more additional tasks allocated to you with no extra time to complete them,” she says. “Every second of the day is timetabled in an effort to prove they are going to get a good Ofsted.” Short breaks for LSAs mid-morning, allowing time to go to the toilet and get a drink, have been taken away, and intervention classes added – just one example of the extra squeeze on LSA time. This has made it difficult to find time for toilet breaks because leaving the classroom is frowned upon. However, following discussions, there is now more flexibility. continued on page 30
educate Your magazine from the National Education Union (NEU)
29
