Around 60 adult education English teachers from more than 20 schools across Melbourne attended the first ever cross-school industry union meeting on 24 May. The event was organised by the Independent Education Union and socialist activists from several different Melbourne English schools. 
The ELICOS (English Language Intensive Courses for Overseas Students) sector is renowned for low wages and poor conditions, with the vast bulk of teachers on contracts earning as little as $25 an hour. Recently, workers at the largest international English language provider, Kaplan International, bucked the trend by fighting for and winning their first enterprise agreement, which secures significant improvements. Another school, Impact English College, has subsequently started negotiations after unionising from scratch. 
The 24 May meeting was organised to reach out to teachers in an industry with very low union density. The atmosphere buzzed with both anger and purpose. The teachers at the meeting raised a variety of issues, but the common threads were low pay, high workloads, casualisation and insecure work. 
The impressive attendance reflects that ESL teachers are fed up. Almost everyone present left their details to find out more about the union and how to organise their own workplace.

IEU member

English teachers get organised 

Teachers in Catholic schools across NSW and the ACT are locked in a bitter dispute with the Catholic Commission for Employment Relations (CCER) over a new enterprise agreement. Since April 2014, when negotiations started, teachers have held numerous stop-work actions, and their union, the Independent Education Union (IEU), has organised a media campaign to raise workers’ concerns over the proposed new agreement. 
Continued pressure has won union members a number of gains, but many issues remain in dispute. IEU members have stood firm against a proposed 10-day reduction to sick leave entitlements, a plan to transition to a lower pay structure, removal of support for provisionally and conditionally accredited teachers, changes to the length of uninterrupted meal breaks and an increase to hours for support staff.
The CCER has coupled its attacks on working conditions and wages with an ideological push to restrict teachers’ beliefs and behaviour. It has proposed that the agreement include a new “ethos clause” which is much more prescriptive than existing provisions applying to teachers and support staff.
Discussions between the CCER and the union have highlighted that the employers are seeking the ability to impose church ideology on workers. It has admitted that it wants employees’ values subject to scrutiny. The CCER is particularly concerned with staff views regarding same-sex relationships, IVF treatment, divorce, abortion and cohabitation outside marriage.
If implemented, the proposed clause will prohibit staff engaging in any “word, action or lifestyle which is contrary to the mission, teaching or values of the Catholic Church”. The rule will cover behaviour “in or out of the workplace”, giving schools the right to pry into the lives of staff. 
The union has labelled the clause “extraordinarily intrusive” and will oppose its inclusion in the agreement. It has also called for government to end the exemption from anti-discrimination laws that applies to Catholic schools and other private education providers. 
To get involved in the IEU campaign, contact your local chapter representative or the IEU head office.

Francisco Pina

Catholic views imposed on teachers

The peak body representing independent schools in NSW is trying to significantly undermine wages and conditions for teachers in non-government schools. The Association of Independent Schools (AIS) is currently negotiating with the teachers’ union (the Independent Education Union NSW/ACT) for a new multi-enterprise agreement (MEA).
The AIS is arguing that teachers in independent schools are overpaid, that some schools can’t afford standard wage increases and many are struggling to maintain enrolments. In order to keep all schools on the same agreement, including those with less capacity to pay, it has insisted that teachers’ 2015 wage increase be a one-off payment, not a percentage increase as is standard.
The AIS’s one-off payment proposal is for a single lump sum payment to be made to teachers next year. The payment would not increase the teachers’ base salary. The size of the payment would be calculated as a percentage of the teacher’s annual salary, with the AIS offering a payment worth 2 percent in 2015.
Also in the AIS’s deal is a push for major changes to the amount of out of class and holiday break work teachers are expected to do, along with more pressure to do extracurricular work without pay.
Though there has been widespread opposition to these attacks among teachers, the IEU has not led a campaign to galvanise the response. Instead the union told teachers that the offer of a 2 percent one-off payment in 2015 was “better than nothing”. As a result most members felt there was no option other than to vote yes to the proposed MEA.
However, union members in nine schools have ignored the union’s recommendation and voted against the agreement on offer; instead putting alternative demands for wage increases and improved conditions. The AIS is encouraging individual schools not to agree to any changes. Members in all nine schools are currently discussing how to force schools and the AIS to renegotiate.

English teachers get organised

Catholic views imposed on teachers

NSW: Nine schools vote down union-backed agreement

Other Media

Shop

Manage Your Subscription

Contact Us