First day of strike at school over job cuts

The first of six scheduled days of strike action have begun at a senior school in Warwick over job losses, a union said.

The National Education Union (NEU) said 11 compulsory redundancies including key student-facing roles at Aylesford School had been among initial proposals, although the school had now committed to no compulsory redundancies.

The school said it was "facing significant financial challenges" and a restructure was achieved with six people going, about 4% of the workforce.

After Thursday, the union has named further strike dates on 9, 11, 16, 18 and 19 June, but said its negotiators aimed to meet the employer again on Friday.

The union said student numbers, which went down partly because of the effect of asbestos closing parts of the site, would "only fall further with the proposed cuts".

The NEU's demand that a four-week consultation be extended was rejected.

It said 88.5% of members who voted were in favour of the action in a ballot, with an 80% turnout.

People "are striking in response to the mass redundancies, the lack of consultation, to ensure safer staffing levels, to reduce unreasonable workload, and to ensure trade union recognition", it said.

Speaking at the site in Tapping Way on Thursday, union rep Hazel Robbins said members wanted to show "how we as a community need to stick together".

"We've not just got members of our union here, we've got students that have turned up this morning, you've got parents that are here this morning," she said.

Another rep, Lauren Wilcock, said: "So you can't create stability by cutting the staff members that are here every day supporting the pupils.

"We're losing some incredible staff."

Aylesford School said that following "a full and meaningful consultation process", there had been no compulsory redundancies.

No substantive new grounds had been presented to justify reopening the consultation, it added.

The primary driver of its financial position was "a sustained decline" in pupil numbers and this challenge had been compounded by previous disruptions, including the partial closure of buildings in 2023, the school said.

However, it was now "fully operational".

The school had concluded staffing reductions were necessary and added a review was under way ahead of September to ensure workloads remained manageable.

It had also "agreed to explore the introduction of a Trade Union Recognition Agreement (TURA)".

Aylesford added it "remains committed to stabilising its financial position" and was willing to engage in dialogue with the NEU, but that some of the union's demands were "not negotiable".

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