Worthing Flash

Kevin Courtney at the Retired Member's conference

These are my notes from the conference.

The importance the union attaches to retired members is shown by the fact Kevin came to address the conference.

NEU Priority Campaigns for 2022

Cost of Living

The costs of living crisis  is bearing down on those least able to cope. Relative poverty is a disgrace but we are getting stories of hungry children. It is also bearing down on support staff colleagues and pensioners.

Nobody is saying 8% is too ambitious for the pay claim now.

There will be a ballot over strike action in October.

Co-ordination of NEU with the unions for support staff will be important in any proposed strike action.

Right now there  has to be a political pressure on the government for a windfall tax on the rich to help those most affected by cost of living.

We are mobilising for the TUC demonstration on 18 June.

We are not used to organising, we have got out of the habit. We are getting back into it!

Workload

This job used to be different.

Teachers and support staff have to fight against a bureaucracy which does not trust them. The joy in teaching is something teachers have to fight for.

Recruitment is at an all-time low.

Other jobs can work from home. The government will have to pay for this lack of flexibility in teaching.

We are seeking to motivate action at school level. There have been successes in having work/life balance policies in individual schools and academy trusts .

The disgrace of the Schools Bill being put to parliament.

It should be dealing with all the problems -

mental health problems post lockdown

recruitment and retention

Schools being turned into exam factories

The central issue in the Bill is structural. They want more Academies. At the present rate it would take forty years to academise every school.

The government data is flawed. The national statistical authority has taken this on board and expressed concern to the government.

There is no evidence that multi academy trusts improve school performance.

One reason schools oppose joining is that they cannot leave.

We can put grit in the wheels.

Legal challenges and strike action have both been effective.

A letter is going out to schools to promote this.

 

Kevin is the one on the right.

 

A Gift of Goddess Lakshmi

This book was written by Manobi Bandyopadhyay in collaboration with Mukherjee Pandey.

The introduction is uncompromising:

"To all those people who humiliated me and called me subhuman, pushing me to the brink of my life. It is because of them that I discovered my strength and fought my way back to life. I hope my book inspires those who are like me and helps them win."

When Manobi was born as a boy he was regarded as "a gift of Goddess Lakshmi". For decades all Manobi's attempts to cope with being "a girl in a boy's body" and later a "woman in a man's body" were met with humiliation and simple confusion from family and colleagues.

Doctors routinely advised Manobi that the treatment for this condition was to "be a man" and the kind of "conversion therapy" which gay people have faced in the UK and the US was recommended.

It was a struggle to find a doctor who would perform the sex-change operation which Manobi needed. Many people in the same condition can only make use of amateur surgeons and that is as dangerous as it sounds.

Manobi is the founder and editor of a magazine which still exists called Abomanob which means "subhuman", a name which reflects the kind of abuse which transgendered people have had to put up with. The magazine gives a voice to transgendered people in a society where simply to be accepted and treated with common decency is a struggle.

It is an inspiring book and it will help explain what transgendered people have to face every day. Socialists should read this book.