Should teachers be banned from striking?

I do not think you will find any employer that pays striking workers

everyone is lashing out against the teachers for striking, saying they're greedy or should only do it in a profession where it wont affect people.
Well, the reason they do it is because it affects people, that's how they get their demands heard. If it made no difference whether or not they were striking, then they'd get nowhere.
As you should all know, ALL teachers are required to be part of a union, NUT is an example of just one. When their union decides they are going to strike, BY LAW, the teachers in that union have to as well whether they want to or not. It's not a matter of greed or ignorance, most teachers have to take marking home so that they can finish it for the next day, not to mention planning lessons for upcoming exams which are constantly getting harder and then carry out those lessons whilst the pupils complain there's too much. They end up having to do more work than most professions and strikes allow them to get fairer pay/pensions for the work they do.

Ummm, no they don't. By law, if it affects them, they must be included in the ballot to decide whether to strike or not, but there is no obligation for them to actually go on strike. If they were obliged to I would be surprised if ANY school was left open today since the majority of staff would have been sat at home.


What's getting harder? The exams, or the planning? Neither are. Not to mention, that for the most part the same plans can be used from one year to the next with minor alterations, unless the syllabus is reworked.


Define "fairer" please.

Hi,

Can Jammy and I ask (again) what you're on about in bold? Its just not not true...

I think by the "they have to be part of a union" thing they're probably just referring to the fact that it would be incredibly foolish not to be in a union as you would be completely unprotected if anything went wrong.

You're completely correct with the strike bit of course, the majority of the relevant teachers in my school chose not to strike on both occasions this year.

Xxx

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I think it's got more to do with the fact that teachers can seemingly strike regardless of the effects on a child's education, but woe betide any parents taking their children out of school for a day or two. Horrendous double standards.

I think it's got more to do with the fact that teachers can seemingly strike regardless of the effects on a child's education, but woe betide any parents taking their children out of school for a day or two. Horrendous double standards.

Do you actually think that a day out is detrimental?

You can't force action unless your protest actually causes some harm. One day off school won't affect a student's learning, but a nation wide strike might affect the government enough to sit up and pay attention.

How?

In the same way strikes usually do? In this case there's the added factor that people will get up in arms about teachers neglecting their duty and that'll put pressure on the government to listen to them.

My point I was trying to make is: striking won't have an impact unless it disrupts something. Banning professions from striking because it's disruptive is therefore completely missing the point.

Teachers need to learn to strike better, as it is nobody in their right mind should be complaining much, it's a mild inconvenience to working parents but has absolutely 0 impact on learning as they already waste that much time it's easy to catch up.

True, but the confusion re thisis actually helpful, as it gives the strike something of a sharper edge, even when it's not justified.

If I were a parent regularly being affected by these strikes that have little hope of going anywhere I would sooner be calling for a change in the system or the outright banning of the strikes before calling for the government to cave to their demands.

Why? If I agreed with the demands (which normally I would I guess) then I don't see why I'd call for no striking. Striking actually gives some accountability.

Why? If I agreed with the demands (which normally I would I guess) then I don't see why I'd call for no striking. Striking actually gives some accountability.

But why is it that they have been striking recently?

Not sure about the recent ones. I know that they were put on a pay freeze for quite a while while inflation kept up. They were striking about that reasonably recently, but the very latest ones... I have no idea. Maybe their salaries are still frozen? Maybe it's just general whining, no knows?