Every year, cost-of-living pay increases are agreed for school support staff and backdated to April- apart from in Cathedral Schools Trust (CST), where the academy chain has been pocketing the money for April- September every year.
Many school support staff are on minimum wage; paid for term-time only and need to have more than one job to make sure they can cover the bills. These essential staff have roles including lunch time supervisors, cleaners, admin staff, support for children with special needs, pastoral, librarians, nurture, language support and teaching assistants, and have been in negotiations with school leaders this year to recoup these stolen wages. The joint-union pressure from the National Education Union (NEU) and UNISON led to this back pay being paid for 2025 and agreed for going forwards, but some staff have had this taken from pay packets for up to 15 years!
Roz Keir NEU rep and Bristol Cathedral Choir School careers lead says, “The trust have had opportunities to give us the back pay but to date have only paid us this year’s amount. We don’t want to strike but we need the money that is owed to us. Support staff are vital to keeping our schools running and are already underpaid for their incredible work.”
Sheila Caffrey, officer of Bristol NEU, said “The trust claims that all support staff are valued and essential to running successful schools, but having reserves of £1 ½ mil, while your lowest-paid members of staff aren’t receiving their full pay is dishonest and disrespectful. We remain committed to negotiations to support our members and education at CST and hope that this can be rectified soon.”
With successful strike ballots, both unions have agreed strike days later this term if CST management don’t repay this money and ensure that these key staff have fair pay and conditions in line with support staff across Bristol moving forwards.
Bristol Trades Union Council 