Picket line at Benjamin Britten High, 8 October

A solid strike at Benjamin Britten High School by NASUWT members saw some 30 determined members of staff picket the school. Headteacher, Andrew Hine. and the School’s Board of Governors have been attempting to add conditions to performance related pay (PRP) which have not been agreed with teachers’ unions.
One strikertold LCAC that targets and league tables, the centralised control of teaching and the transfer of schools to unaccountable academies have produced not one jot of improvement, in fact things had got worse. PRP is not only a stupid idea its main purpose is to divide and control teachers. The teachers are right to strike.
Faced with obdurate management teachers continued their strike for a second week and won. Bizarrely an OFSTED inspection took place with hardly any pupils or teachers in the school. NASUWT president Geoff Branner and NUT’s Graham White who were visiting the picket line offered to speak with Andrew Hine, but he was “too busy with OFST ED” to see them, only to change his mind five minutes later. The next day management backed down.