Job cut dispute withdrawn following strike action at primary school in Lewes

The vote took place on Friday, March 28, following strike action outside Western Road Community Primary School on Wednesday, March 12.

Striking teachers were joined at the demonstration by parents, pupils, councillors and Lewes MP James MacCleary.

The NEU said members persuaded their employer to abandon plans to cut more than half the school’s teaching assistants. The NEU said East Sussex County Council (ESCC) has confirmed that the school is no longer proposing any compulsory redundancies and has abandoned its proposed restructure of staff.

The school’s NEU workplace reps Margie Krijnauw and Bronwen Ferber said: “Following the strike action, we are pleased that we have been able to avoid compulsory staff redundancies. The teachers and support staff stood together to rally against the proposed cuts, and we would like to thank the parents and the wider community for their tremendous support.”

But they said: “Unfortunately, we will still lose four valued members of support staff, including three Individual Needs Assistants (INAs) and a Teaching Assistant (TA). This leaves us with concerns regarding workload, but we are continuing to actively negotiate ways to manage this to ensure we continue to deliver the highest quality education that our children deserve.”

The NEU said the initial proposal was to reduce the number of permanent teaching assistants from seven to three but the school will now retain all seven permanent teaching assistants.

NEU Senior Regional Officer Nick Childs said: “We are pleased that we have been able to avoid compulsory redundancies of permanent teaching assistants. The fact that the threat to jobs happened in an oversubscribed and popular local school illustrates the dire national funding crisis in education. Members and parents should be proud of the stand they took and the outcome that was obtained.”

Western Road Community Primary School has been approached for comment.