Acting Allowances
22nd July 2019
Teacher Unions Working Together for YOU
Trade unions representing 375,000 teachers across the UK recently launched an historic partnership. The unions representing teachers in Northern Ireland, Scotland, England and Wales have agreed to work in partnership for the benefit of teachers in their respective countries. Despite the differing education systems many of the challenges teachers face are the same and this partnership will enable the unions to address these more effectively and allow all members to benefit from support from the appropriate union should they move between the countries of the UK.
Many young teachers from Northern Ireland currently travel to schools across the water to get a teaching post. This historic partnership agreement ensures that no matter where they choose to teach, they are covered automatically by one of “The Big Four” unions. The teacher unions in the partnership are the Irish National Teachers’ Organisation (INTO), the Ulster Teachers’ Union (UTU), the National Union of Teachers (NUT)* and the Educational Institute of Scotland (EIS). The four unions have agreed to work as partners in close co-operation, campaigning together where appropriate, and promoting our shared trade union values.
These four unions have always worked very closely together, and the partnership agreement cements the transfer arrangements for teachers who move from one region to another. This agreement will strengthen existing links and co-operation between the four unions and will be of great benefit to teachers.
The Agreement strengthens each Partner by facilitating both the sharing of information and ideas and also joint campaigning on issues that cut across the different education systems within the UK. At the same time each union retains its independence and ability to focus its work on the education system specific to their respective jurisdictions.
* From 1 September 2017 the NUT has merged with the ATL (Association of Teachers and Lecturers) for form the National Education Union (NEU).
Links to Our Partnership Organisations' Websites:
UTU Website: www.utu.edu/
NEU Website: www.neu.org.uk/
EIS Website: www.eis.org.uk/