Workers seek implementation of negotiated pay and grading review to deliver equality and pay improvement

In absence of move by secretary of state, education support staff will escalate their action over next three weeks 

Unite the union has served notice to the education authority of further strike dates over the next three weeks. The workers will take eight days of strike action beginning on Wednesday 17 January (see notes to editors). 

The industrial action which will involve approximately 800 Unite members represents an escalation of ongoing industrial dispute seeking implementation of a pay and grading review which will help address the chronic issue of low pay among education support staff. 

Unite general secretary Sharon Graham said: “The funding to deliver the pay and grading review is available but it is being withheld by the secretary of state for Northern Ireland. It is disgraceful that workers’ pay is being used as a political bargaining tool. 

“The school support staff have the full and continuing support of Unite in their struggle to improve pay and secure fairness.”

Unite’s members in the education authority are concentrated in various roles including:  school bus transport, catering, admin, cleaning, classroom assistants. The strikes are likely to cause significant disruption across many schools.

The NJC pay settlement of 2018 instructed that there should be a pay and grading review but this was not implemented. Following strike action by Unite members in the education authority in 2022, a consensus between unions and employer representatives was reached for its implementation but has not been delivered since.

Lead regional officer for the education authority Kieran Ellison said, “The education authority was instructed to implement the pay and grading review in 2018 but it has failed to deliver. This has already resulted in strike action in 2022. Members have been waiting far too long. We need to see delivery for our members.

“This review should provide a fair and equal pay structure but also a much needed improvement for some of the lowest paid workers. The actions of the secretary of state in recent weeks show that the money is there. That funding must now be released regardless of whether a Stormont executive is re-established or not.”

ENDS…

Note for editors: 

Unite members in the education authority who are paid under the NJC scale (the overwhelming majority) will be on strike on the following dates on Wednesday 17, Thursday 18 and Friday 19^thJanuary; Wednesday 24^th, Thursday 25^th and Friday 26^th January; and Thursday 1^st and Friday 2^nd February.

For further information or to arrange an interview contact Donal O’Cofaigh, Unite Campaigns & Communications (NI), Tel. 07810 157926.

Twitter: @uniteunionNI; Facebook: unitetheunionNI; Instagram: unitetheunionNI; web: www.unitetheunionireland.org

Unite is the UK and Ireland’s leading union fighting to protect and advance jobs, pay and conditions for members working across all sectors of the economy. The general secretary is Sharon Graham.