School leaders’ union NAHT Northern Ireland today (Mon 13 March) announces that it is escalating its ongoing industrial action short of strike due to a lack of response from government and employers to the dispute thus far.

NAHT NI wrote to the employing authorities twice in February, to urge for a resolution by the end of February. Not only did no resolution come, the employing authorities treated our members with such disregard that they didn’t even reply.

School leaders are very annoyed, not just on the issue of pay, but also on the wider failings across our system, including workload, SEN, funding, etc.

Appalled that there has been no furtherance in addressing teacher pay, and being cognisant of the increasing impact on recruitment and retention, NAHT NI has decided to escalate its action short of strike, warning employers that ‘nothing is off the table in terms of what industrial levers we will be prepared to execute.’

The list of escalated actions short of strike includes extended refusal to engage with employers, government or the inspectorate, as well as refusal to pass on communications to staff or governors from employers or the DE, and a strict adherence to a 37.5 hour working week.

Liam McGuckin, president of NAHT in Northern Ireland said: “School leaders have taken this dispute on for the future of education in Northern Ireland. With career paths in education no longer being competitive with other industries, we are now seeing difficulties in recruitment and retention. Children in Northern Ireland have been short-changed again and again and again when it comes to financing and resourcing education in comparison with our neighbours. Our members are no longer prepared to accept this.

“We believe that our children deserve the best that we, as a society, can give; we want the best teachers and school leaders to be put in front of them and kept in front of them. To this end, to make the job of teaching an attractive career prospect again, and to fairly remunerate our staff for the extremely challenging job that they do, the employers really must end this pay dispute immediately and urgently resolve a series of other outstanding and significant issues around workload, funding, support and resourcing.

“Without any serious attempt to provide a settlement, we have had no option other than to escalate our actions. We are, effectively, curtailing the functions of the wider system, and this escalation represents our membership’s serious intent. We will continue to escalate and we consider that no industrial lever is off the table.”

Notes to editors:

Full list of actions short of strike being taken by NAHT NI members from Monday 13 March 2023:

1. Refuse to facilitate or cooperate with unsolicited Ministerial and senior civil servant visits to schools.
2. Refuse to provide information to employers regarding staff participating industrial action.
3. Refuse unsolicited contact from the employing authorities and the DE on any issue outside of a prespecified one-hour-per-week allocation, save for legitimate matters of safeguarding.
4. Refuse to provide information, data or financial planning to employers and/or other relevant bodies, whether directly or indirectly, refuse to meet with LMS or any employing authority body pursuant to financial planning and refuse to provide data that is available elsewhere.
5. Refuse to engage with and/or attend Area Learning Community (ALC) and Pathways to Partnership meetings with employing authority personnel or representatives, the School Improvement Programme and the EA School Principals’ Forum.
6. Refuse to facilitate school visits by School Development Services, save for legitimate safeguarding issues or if the school is in Formal Intervention.
7. Refuse to engage with School Improvement Professionals, any unsolicited contact/correspondence from employers, save for legitimate safeguarding issues or if the school is in Formal Intervention.
8. Refuse to promote, facilitate or engage with any new initiatives, refuse to attend training events or meetings convened by the employers and refuse to create new policies or update existing policies, save for legitimate safeguarding training.
9. Refuse to engage with Education and Training Inspectorate (ETI) in any way, save for in relation to any pre-identified safeguarding issue.
10. Refuse to do anything in relation to School Development Planning.
11. Refuse to operate, engage with or implement PRSD for any member of staff who is at the top of their respective scale, including the vice principal and principal.
12. Refuse to attend, facilitate or assist more than one Board of Governors meeting per term or disseminate (or assist with the dissemination of) training materials to governors.
13. Refuse to facilitate any budget-based redundancy for any member of staff.
14. Refuse to pass on any communications to staff or Governors that emanate from the employing authorities or the DE.
15. Refuse to undertake any business travel unless arrangements for reimbursement have been provided in advance of travel.
16. Adhere to the working hours of the equivalent civil service grade of 37.5 hours per week.
17. Refuse to submit the Annual Census electronically, and refuse to submit any other information, data or monitoring forms electronically.