New law would keep schools open during teachers’ strikes

Six key sectors could be forced to provide basic coverage during walkouts under plans unveiled by Grant Shapps

Grant Shapps
Grant Shapps said he would ‘rather we never have to go down’ the route of issuing targets Credit: Leon Neal/Getty Images

Teachers are being threatened with a new law that would keep schools open during strikes as they prepare to vote on industrial action next week.

Ministers have unveiled plans to introduce minimum service levels across key public sectors, including education, in a bid to beat mass walkouts.

Under the blueprint, employers would be able to enforce a basic degree of coverage and dismiss staff who refuse to turn up to work when ordered to. Businesses would be given the ability to sue unions for financial compensation if they failed to meet the required minimum service level.

Junior doctors, who start to be balloted on walkouts next week in a dispute over pay rises, would also be covered by the new legislation.

Grant Shapps, the Business Secretary, said schools would be forced to stay open to provide care for disabled children and those of key workers. He added that the minimum service level would also cover “other special circumstances where providing ongoing education is absolutely essential”.

The law will give ministers the powers to enforce minimum service levels in six sectors – health, transport, education, fire, border security and nuclear. 

But it is set to take up to six months to pass Parliament, with stiff resistance expected in the Lords, meaning it will not be in place for the forthcoming strikes.

Initially, it will apply to firefighters, ambulance staff and rail workers, whilst Number 10 will try to strike voluntary agreements with doctors, nurses and teaching unions.

Mr Shapps said it would “always be the preference” to do such deals and he would “rather we never have to go down” the route of issuing targets, adding that the proposed law would “restore the balance between those seeking to strike and protecting the public from disproportionate disruption”.

The Business Secretary insisted the reform was needed because it was “unacceptable” that lives were being put at risk by NHS strikes – but it sparked fury from union leaders who threatened to sink it with legal action, arguing that it would infringe their members’ human rights.

Kevin Courtney, the joint general secretary of the National Education Union, said: “They want to have a situation where you have a right to strike but no meaningful way to do it. I think the public will see that they are extremely one-sided.”

Geoff Barton, the general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders, dismissed it as “sabre-rattling and hardly conducive to cordial industrial relations” and said: “Instead of playing games, the Government should address the immediate crisis of severe teacher shortages and improve funding to education.”

Health unions also condemned the plans ahead of the British Medical Association holding a vote on walkouts by junior doctors on Monday. 

The union is preparing to open a ballot of 45,000 medics in England and has said members are “very likely” to strike in a campaign calling for pay rises of more than a quarter. Industrial action by doctors would be the first since 2016, when strikes culminated in the removal of emergency cover, forcing senior medics to step in.

Walkouts would come in the spring, following two days of consecutive strike action by nurses, planned for Jan 18 and 19, and two separate days of ambulance strikes, due on Jan 11 and 23.

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Pat Cullen, the general secretary of the Royal College of Nurses, said the union would meet ministers to discuss the pay process, but that only negotiations could avert the planned strikes.

“As for minimum staffing, last month’s action was safe for patients because of detailed discussions we chose to initiate with the NHS to protect emergency services and life-saving care,” she said.

Gary Smith, the secretary of the GMB union, which represents ambulance workers, accused ministers of “seeking to scapegoat the NHS staff and ambulance workers who do so much to care for the people of our country”.

Ambulance workers from GMB and Unison are due to take part in a second strike on Jan 11 in protest at a four per cent pay rise.

Data released by NHS Digital on Thursday showed that overall, average pay for ambulance workers rose by almost six per cent in the 12 months ending last September to £36,288. The figures include rises given when staff are moved up a pay band.