County Durham teaching assistants will not suffer in deal, meeting told

TEACHING assistants are to be consulted on new grading proposals in a bid to bring their long running dispute with Durham County Council to an end.

The breakthrough was revealed at a meeting of Barnard Castle Town Council on Monday last week and confirmed by county council leader Cllr Simon Henig two days later.
Teaching assistants had been faced with the imposition of new contracts which they say would have led to pay cuts of up to 23 per cent.
However, after strike action, these proposals were ditched in favour of a review launched last December involving teaching assistants, head teachers, the county council and trades unions.
The issue was brought before Barnard Castle Town Council during a question and answer session with the county council’s chief executive, Terry Collins.
Teaching assistant Catherine Bonnett said since the county council first proposed the change to contracts, many had been forced to move to better paid jobs in neighbouring authorities or leave the profession.
“If this happens in Barnard Castle, recruiting equally experienced and trained staff will not be easy,” she said.
“As a consequence, our children may find themselves taught by lower skilled support staff lacking the experience and knowledge that the current teaching assistants have.”
Mr Collins responded: “Everything has been suspended. There has been positive, constructive dialogue between the council and trades unions, working closely with a group of teaching assistants and a team of head teachers.”
He said this work had been “non-stop”.
“The bottom line is we are hopeful we can make progress with this matter and we can resolve this situation.
“The council wants this to be resolved as soon as possible. There has been incredible pace around this.
“All the issues that have been raised are being factored into the discussions.”
Cllr Judi Sutherland said she had contacted Cllr Henig and asked for an update on the situation when she heard the issue was to be raised at the town council.
“The way this is likely to be resolved is that teaching assistants will be regraded to a point where none of them will suffer.”
This was confirmed on Wednesday last week when Cllr Henig posted a video update on the county council's Facebook page.
He said: “We are now extremely close to confirming new grading proposals which will mark a sea change from where we were previously.
“Quite rightly, the details of the new proposals will need to be communicated to schools and individual teaching
assistants as quickly as possible.
“There will be a full and thorough consultation process and the project board anticipates this next phase will commence in the coming weeks.”
He added: “We will still need to work closely with each school to ensure their individual teaching assistant roles are correctly matched to proposed new job descriptions.
“This will allow us to confirm the position for every individual teaching assistant when we consult on the new proposals.”
Cllr Henig said arrangements were being made to visit schools in the coming weeks.