Primary school teachers head into collective agreement negotiations tomorrow for the first time since the Government scrapped their pay equity claim.
The shock axing of their pay equity claim under urgency has left teachers feeling collective agreement negotiations are the only way right now to achieve movement on teacher pay.
Primary teacher Liam Rutherford, one of the teachers leading the negotiations, says losing the pay equity claim was a huge blow for the teaching workforce – which is mostly women – and has shifted the dial on pay for this round of negotiations.
“Teachers were really angry and upset about losing pay equity – their pathway to correcting gender-based pay discrimination after years of being undervalued. Right now, the only realistic way of getting teachers’ work valued is through collective bargaining.”
The negotiations will begin after a Talbot Mills survey, released today by NZEI Te Riu Roa, shows 77% of New Zealanders believe teachers, and others working in education, should be paid more.
The survey found 38% of people think teachers, and others in education, should be paid much more, 39% think they should be paid a bit more, and 7% were unsure. Only 16% thought they were paid enough.
The survey was carried out in May, shortly after the Government pushed through the pay equity law changes without consultation and under urgency.
NZEI Te Riu Roa, the union for primary educators, begins collective agreement negotiations on Tuesday on behalf of about 25,000 primary teachers.
Rutherford says despite the Government celebrating a recent increase in the number of new teachers in primary schools, what teachers are looking for most is to be valued fairly.
“As educators who work with ākonga every day, we can tell you, the teacher shortage is far from over. We do not have enough teachers to go around, and there’s still nowhere near enough support for children with additional needs.
“In Budget 2025, we lost the largest pool of expert teachers – our resource teachers of Māori and Literacy, and those who provided their knowledge through the Kāhui Ako programme – we’ve ever seen in our careers, with no clear pathway to replacing them.”
Rutherford says while the Government has put forward more funding for learning support, every teacher needs a teacher aide in every classroom.
“The answer is pretty simple: we need the Government to truly value teachers and our mahi – and that means fair pay and enough support in the classroom for kaiako as well as ākonga in need.”