CLANCY OVERELL | Editor | CONTACT
Hundreds of schools are closed in New South Wales today, as the state’s teachers remind the government of what happens when they make them raise their voice.
Staff shortages and stagnant wages are the main concerns of the thousands of teachers currently striking through Sydney.
The union says that the issues stem from the blatant disregard of he state government, and have been magnified by a pandemic that has seen the entire sector forced to learn how to operate new software and educate unruly children online, before being forced back into the classrooms to face the wet market of unvaxxed children.
Striking for the first time in nearly a decade, both teachers and principals are demanding a salary increase of between five to 7.5 per cent a year to recognise the fact that they are making less than a 21-year-old property agent, in a country that has all but ruled out educators from home ownership and a basic standard of living.
The new and improved neoliberal Perrottet government have only poured petrol on the fire today, with NSW Education Minister Sarah Mitchell yesterday said she was “disappointed” by the strike action, saying students have experienced enough disruption this year without having to worry about the whingeing educators who are living pay check to pay check.
The virtually unknown NSW cabinet Minister also went on to say that the teachers are running a protection racket that fights transparency and is hell-bent on hanging students out to dry for political purposes. Not exactly a flying start to the industrial negotiations.
However, new Department of Education statistics can reveal are more than 3000 vacant permanent teaching positions in the state and one in five Year 7 to 10 teachers are working outside their area of expertise, and dipping into their own pockets to pay for classroom supplies.
The teachers are disciplining the disruptive class clown that is Premier Dominic Perrottet, after 10 years of Liberal Governments ignoring their demands to focus on propping up the manipulating NSW property bubble.
“This is your own doing” says the teachers.
“Dominic. I want you to go and sit in the corner and have good hard think about what you’ve done to cause this situation”
