The editor: Decision for teachers to strike during exams a disgrace

The Queensland Teachers’ Union’s decision to undertake strike action during the middle of year 12 exams was a disgrace.

QTU members marching during the teachers strike from Brisbane Exhibition and Convention Centre to Queensland Parliament, 6 August 2025. Picture: Tara Croser.

The Queensland Teachers’ Union’s decision to undertake strike action during the middle of year 12 exams was a disgrace.

The backlash against the union, and their disregard for the impact the industrial action would have had on Queensland students thankfully forced them to call it off late on Friday.

The union had advised police that thousands of teachers would walk off the job in the city in the middle of the day on Thursday – the same day thousands of year 12s would be sitting language exams.

QTU executive members decided on the November 13 strike after a meeting on Thursday night after tense wage negotiations with the state government broke down again.

Thursday’s strike, scheduled for 11am, would have been the second in three months after 50,000 teachers walked off the job in August – the first teachers’ strike in Queensland in 16 years.

Instead teachers will rally after school has ended on Thursday, sparing any disruption to students.

But the threat of more strikes before the end of the school year looms large.

“I can confirm that we’ve been looking at a multitude of dates … It’s to be determined,” QTU president Cresta Richardson said late Friday.

Teachers’ Union members last week rejected the government’s final pay offer of 8 per cent over three years. It now looks certain the parties will go to arbitration on December 31 which could drag on and push any new wage deal out by more than a year.

Ms Richardson is demanding Premier David Crisafulli intervene with an upfront 3 per cent pay rise, which is almost certainly not going to happen.

The strike backflip ended a chaotic day involving indecision, cancelled press conferences and insults flying between the state government and QTU.

Pressed on why the union had suddenly cancelled the planned strike, Ms Richardson said it was “a logistical thing”.

But the QTU came under increasing pressure after The Courier-Mail revealed the planned action would coincide with crucial year 12 exams disrupting up to 7000 students.

Soon after Director-General Sharon Schimming came out swinging.

Ms Schimming condemned the timing of the strike as “ill-considered” and warned it would damage “student outcomes, welfare and community perceptions of the teaching profession”, adding: “It will bring our profession into disrepute”.

As the wage war intensifies between the state government and QTU, one thing is clear – Queensland students, particularly those under immense exam pressures, should not be caught in the crossfire.