Australian Education Union ballot endorses State Government’s enterprise bargaining offer
Education union members have endorsed the State Government’s offer. But it’s not necessarily an end to industrial action.
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A slim majority of Australian Education Union members have voted in favour of the State Government’s enterprise bargaining offer, bringing their formal industrial dispute a step closer to an end.
However, it will not necessarily mean an end to controversial workload reduction actions such as teachers not writing comments on student report cards or moving evening events to the daytime.
The vote was 54 per cent in favour of the Government’s offer, which includes a 2.35 per cent pay rise for teachers (3.35 per cent for principals and preschool directors) and an extra $15 million a year for schools to cope with rising numbers of students with special needs.
Better incentives for teachers to work in country schools, capping teaching time to 24 hours a week in standalone preschools, and reducing teaching loads for principals in small schools were also in the offer.
AEU state president-elect Lara Golding said: “It was a very close result and it should be a clear wake-up call to the Government that while this matter may be settled for now, many of our members are prepared to take further actions to manage their excessive workloads and advocate for better resources for their students. Many of our members have told us that class size and complexity are key concerns.”
However Treasurer Rob Lucas said the ballot result was “a big tick of approval for the offer”.
“This is a huge vote of confidence in the offer from AEU members who are at the coalface in the classroom,” Mr Lucas said.
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“Every school will receive funding, which will be used to assist teachers in managing their workload relating to students with complex needs, for example, by engaging additional teachers or support staff and to meet the cost of expert assistance.”
The offer will now be put to a vote of all 28,000 of the state’s public teachers, principals and support staff early next year.