School support staff strikes 'We haven't taken this action lightly'

A DOZEN schools across Bristol were either closed or partially closed yesterday as a strike by support staff took place.

- Tristan CORK

Higher Level TA Ellie Hornshaw, right, with Cara Parry and Jen Clarke, pastoral mentors from Cathedral Primary on the picket line

The teaching assistants, special needs assistants, admin, lunchtime and catering staff at all 12 schools run by the Bristol-based Cathedral Schools Trust are holding the first day of a two-day strike this week, in a dispute over back pay.

Picket lines were set up at schools from Pill to Lockleaze and Ashton Gate to St Werburghs as the staff walked out as a dispute with academy trust bosses escalated after weeks of negotiations. The biggest picket was outside the Cathedral secondary and primary schools in the city centre, but pickets were mounted at every school affected.

Striking staff said they had not taken the decision to go on strike lightly, and appreciated the inconvenience for parents who found their children’s schools closed.

But while academy trust bosses said they were ‘disappointed’ that staff had gone on strike, but politicians from the two main parties at City Hall backed the striking staff, with one MP saying the way staff were being treated was ‘shameful’.

The dispute centres around the timing of annual national pay rises. These come into force on April 1 every year, but Cathedral School Trust had been delaying the pay rises until the start of the academic year on September 1. Union representatives of the admin and support staff at Cathedral Schools Trust negotiated a deal to make sure this year’s pay rise was backdated to April 1, and any future pay rises would come into force from April 1.