Industry News
New body for school support staff
Posted on 27th September 2007
The government has announced the creation of a new body to negotiate pay and conditions for more than 300,000 school support staff in Britain.
It says support staff play a "distinctive and increasingly important" role in schools and that the new body will give a bigger voice to such workers.
The new body will focus on the needs of the schools, rather than simply considering support staff along with other local government employees, said the Department for Children, Schools and Families.
Schools minister Jim Knight said pay and conditions for the staff needed to reflect the contribution they make to the classroom and to freeing up teachers' time.
He said: "This new group will work in the interests of all support staff, ensuring they are fairly rewarded for the work they do, as well as making it easier for school leaders to recruit the best staff and reward them fairly."
Website SchoolSupportStaff.co.uk claims the term refers not just to teaching assistants but to learning support workers, bursars, secretaries and more.
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