Teachers in Glasgow are to be asked to vote in favour of action “up to and including” strikes as they step up their fight against cuts to school staffing levels.
Urging members to back industrial action, the Glasgow EIS spokesperson said that it would be a “vote to reject the Council’s dangerous proposals”.
As a result of an SNP-Green budget deal, Glasgow City Council is in the process of axing 450 teaching posts from the city’s schools over the next three years.
Parent groups have pursued a campaign of protests against the plans and earlier this month began legal action against the council. Unions representing headteachers and depute heads have also spoken out and urged the council to think again.
Last week, Dyslexia Scotland and the National Autistic Society rejected council claims that the cuts will have no significant impact on pupils with disabilities.
Now members of the EIS union will be formally asked if they are willing to take part in industrial action, including strikes, in an attempt to force the council the change course. The statutory ballot will open on Monday 2 September and run until Tuesday 1 October.
The NASUWT teaching union has also declared a dispute over the proposed cuts. Further information on their next steps is expected soon.
Commenting on the decision to open the ballot, EIS Glasgow Local Association Secretary Jane Gow said:
“Following a resounding mandate for Industrial Action in a Consultative Ballot in June, Glasgow EIS will launch a statutory ballot for industrial action on Monday 2nd September. This ballot will run until 1st October and is an integral part of the Local Association’s Glasgow No Cuts Campaign which lodged a dispute with our employer in March over budget proposals to axe 450 teaching posts over Glasgow’s three-year budget.
“As schools returned this month, 172 posts had already been lost across our primary and secondary schools and, with 125 lost throughout the previous session added to 450 overall, this amounts to 10% of the entire teacher workforce in Glasgow. The EIS is calling on Glasgow Council to withdraw its damaging plan to cut these posts and to refrain from further cuts to teacher numbers.”
“The EIS is crystal clear that the loss of jobs vital to education provision in Glasgow will irreparably damage the life chances of many of the city’s young people and most especially those with additional support needs.
“For the avoidance of doubt, all mainstream schools have young people with a wide range of additional support needs. It is the Education Department’s policy that all mainstream pupils, with or without ASN, remain in class settings for the majority of their daily educational experience to be primarily supported by their classroom teachers while in this setting. All teachers are ASN teachers and to lose 10%, from an already struggling service, must be resisted at all costs.”
“Further, the ill-judged proposal to remove these posts in Glasgow will have significant and damaging effect on Scottish Government’s policy to close the poverty related attainment gap which is widening in front of our eyes. Our city contains 35% of Scotland’s children who live in the most deprived areas. These pupils need more targeted teaching and support, more small group learning and more teachers to nurture them towards attainment and achievement, not fewer. The loss of 172 teachers at the start of this session with the hammer blow threat of more to go will only ensure that it is our most vulnerable young people and communities who will suffer the most.”
“Glasgow EIS urges all of its members to take part in this important ballot, and to use their vote to reject the Council’s dangerous proposals. Our young people deserve the best opportunity to achieve their potential, and these cuts from Glasgow City Council would have a massively damaging impact on all pupils in Glasgow, with the hardest impact on some of the most vulnerable young people within our school communities.”
A Glasgow City Council spokeswoman said: “The EIS has notified us of their statutory ballot, and we will await the outcome in due course.
"In the meantime, we will continue to liaise with union colleagues."
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