to ask if you agree with the teacher's strike upcoming

[AuntiePickleBottom]

i am on the fence about it, due to not understanding pensions.

[twinklypearls]

I was referring to salaries. I don't understand why it is OK for some people to be motivated by a salary but others should be in it just for the kids.

[trixymalixy]

LGPS on the other hand is a funded scheme. Employee's and employer's contributions do go into a fund and are invested so it is easy to see the shortfall.

[twinklypearls]

My reason for striking when the NAS calls us out is that we are going to see the quality of teachers decline because of this. If I were younger I would leave teaching at this point and tbh I may still. My daughter wants to be a teacher and I have suggested that she thinks about something else.

I constantly hear very bright students say that they want to be teachers but the pay puts them off. This will only make matters worse.

It will also put people off becoming headteachers, especially in the primary sector where there is already a shortage.

[TalkinPeace2]

The trouble is that the £233 billion liability for pensions of those currently in teaching / retired has to come from somewhere
we either cut the deficit and bring our lifestyles within our means
or we scupper our childrens' chances of a decent life

[Mammonite]

No correlation between current contributions and the future size of the "pot", maybe you mean? Absolutely. Tomorrow's working teachers will have to pay today's teachers' pensions. (apostrophe nightmare there)

I thought Govt have to pay pensions already earned, by law, otherwise there wouldn't be a deficit and you could just reduce all the current pensions by 20%.

[Lizzylou]

I think anyone striking at the moment is being shortsighted.

The jobs climate as it is I think they need to have some empathy with other workers, people with no pension plans, people who may have studied for years and have huge debts and the best they can hope for is a £13k paralegal job (I am in legal recruitment). And that entry level £13k paralegal job has been the same since I started in legal recruitment, so since 1999. And course fees and thus debts have gone up. Firms have people clamouring to work for free, and they do so, for years.

I honestly don't think that teachers are as poorly paid as other professions anymore, they're not. Lawyers/Accountants don't earn much, if anything more. They really honestly don't. Not in the regions, outside of the capital and even major city centres.

I advertised a v junior role and got people so qualified, I mean 3 degrees, exec level types applying. In fact for that one, poorly paid job I got 300 applicants. It's fucking tough out there and for people in jobs to be moaning about their pensions, when others have no jobs and are applying against 300 others? Shite.

[TalkinPeace2]

mammonite -
Once somebody has retired, unless their scheme goes bust and enters the PPF, the pension terms on their retirement date have to be adhered to (public and private sector)

So what schemes do is alter the terms for those still in work and rely on those with the jammy deal dying soon.

In the PPF, index linking goes as do any other increments and widows pensions drop by up to 25%

[Mammonite]

Thanks yes that was what I thought.

[twinklypearls]

So because some people do not have jobs ( and my dp is constantly facing losing his job) the rest of us have to lie down and take it. At some point we have to stand up to the government and say this is wrong and the public sector are ideally placed to do this.

I do not want mediocre people with no drive teaching my grandchildren, this is where we will end up.

Once again the government is targetting women as it will be female teachers with children who will lose out the most.

I am very poorly paid compared to the people I graduated with, I accept that as I knew the wage when I went for the job.

[justonemorethen]

Twinkly pearls - what has "bright student"s got to do with it. Teachers need to be good communicators, like children and be creative in what they teach.Plenty of bright kids without these skills.
Lot's of people work because they love the job not because of the money. Teaching on the other hand also attracts people who can't think what else to do with a degree, want a reasonable rate of pay and think working 39 weeks a year is better than working 48.
Can't see that paying top rates will get better teachers. You either want to be a vet, a doctor or an accountant or you don't. If you do any of these jobs for the money you're going to be pretty miserable if you really wanted to be a teacher whatever a teacher is paid.

[trixymalixy]

There is no future "pot", no fund is built up. Teacher's contributions go straight out to pay current pensions, with over double that paid out by the government directly from taxes.

Current teachers future pensions will be paid similarly out of future teachers contributions with any shortfall being paid from taxation.

[TalkinPeace2]

twinkly
As a teacher you earn more than the average.
You are obviously not in touch with everybody from your university.

Why is the government wrong to get the deficit under control?
Whoever won the election would have had to make cuts like these.

Or are you happy for your children to have NO PENSION AT ALL because there will be no money by the time they are 40 and your colleagues are swanning around on their preserved pensions paid for out of the next generation?

[expatinscotland]

'At some point we have to stand up to the government and say this is wrong and the public sector are ideally placed to do this.'

It's wrong that our generation can't be economically inactive for years and years and our children be forced to pay for it when their noses are being pushed closer and closer to the grindstone all the time as the cost of everything goes up?

This isn't about us! It's about them.

And sorry, but I'm not prepared for my kids to live in penury so my generation can swan around playing golf for decades and decades then wind up in care homes costing hundreds of thousands of pounds a year. It's unfair and it would be really stupid of me to think they'll put up with that.

So no, I don't support the strikes.

[Lizzylou]

No that's fine Twinklypearls, but speaking as a Mother who's DC's Headmaster went on a year long sick (paid) whilst other people would have lost their job within weeks, sorry. You can't have it all ways.

Anmd these people who are out of work/on temp work because of the economic climate/scared to take time off/self employed are the teachers pupil's parents.
We don't all exist in a bubble. A bit of commercial/economic awareness wouldn't go astray.

[Feenie]

You can't have full pay for a year on sick leave, Lizzylou. And how do you know what he was paid?

[Lizzylou]

He played the system v well, he was back for a few days then went off again, ad nauseum.
I know as he is a neighbour.

[TalkinPeace2]

Feenie
www.atl.org.uk/Images/Burgundy%20book.pdf
Page 12
yes they can

[justonemorethen]

Er actually Feenie I know someone off for a year sick on full pay.

[Feenie]

Yes, was just looking at that document, TalkinPeace2. Where does it say a teacher may have full sick pay for a year?

How do you know he wasn't genuinely ill/recovered, Lizzylou?

[Lizzylou]

I didn't actually say if he was paid in full or not, the suspicions are there, but hey.
I just said "paid".

BUT my point still stands, teaching is no longer the lower paid profession, just talk to some Accountants and Solicitors. Find out about their salary/pension/holiday/benefits. Seriously, at the moment, you don't know you're born. That is not always the case, I'll grant you. But at the moment? Teaching is a bloody good gig!

[TalkinPeace2]

for a start it does not say you can't
when I audit employment contracts they normally say full pay for n weeks then SSP only.
That only talks about the rolling year and deductions for benefits received.
And public sector cases of staff off sick for long periods are well documented:
as a school governor I saw an 8 month full pay that we persuaded to retire

[twinklypearls]

I want bright people with excellent communication skills to teach. I suspect many of these people will be tempted elsewhere. Do you just want saintly types to go into teaching or the best?

[TalkinPeace2]

I'm not a teacher because I'm much too psychotic
but I have no pension
no paid holiday
no sick pay
and I'm working on a VAT return right now

[twinklypearls]

Justonemorethen there will be people who could make very good teachers who will be put of by the wage and now the pension cuts. I am a very good teacher , I went into teaching because 1) I wanted to 2) I was about to marry someone who had a very large income so I did not have to worry about money. If I was with my current dp when I was choosing my career I would not have chosen teaching.

[Feenie]

Ok Lizzylou. And why don't you try teaching, if you think it's so fantastic?

Talkinpeace2, it says 'During fourth and subsequent years - full pay for 100 working days and half pay for 100 working days.'