Are teachers ashamed of their unions’ approach when essential workers on the front line have carried on with barely a whimper? - YEP letters
I am beginning to question the motives behind the NEU’s (National Education Union) opposition to schools re-opening.
I think we should re-open schools very quickly, especially primary and infant schools, from June 1 for the following reasons.
Whilst there will always be exceptions, there is no hard evidence to suggest young children can contract this disease or can be silent carriers and I do wonder whether they need to social distance at all. We can’t base policy on something we don’t know.
This brings me to the teachers unions’ resistance to reopening, purporting to be concerned for the welfare of children, their families, their communities and their staff. In other words everyone!
I believe their opposition to reopening is unlikely to represent the views of the majority of hard working teachers.
However, I do wonder whether some teachers will feel ashamed by their unions’ approach when essential workers, in the front line working with the highest risk groups, have carried on with barely a whimper, some paying with their lives.
With Patrick Murphy proclaiming the city would pay a “high price” and one teacher (age 27) in the national press a few days ago claiming they were being “fed to the wolves” the unions seem to be using inflammatory language to oppose any sensible steps being taken to cautiously get our children back to school and our workforce back to work.
No one is denying the link between restarting the economy and getting children back to school. We need to remember the majority of teachers are public employees and have not been furloughed or laid off and have maintained full salary, benefits and very generous pension contributions from the tax payer throughout. Public employees make up approximately 16 per cent of the working population in the UK.