Valuing our teachers and school leaders
Queensland Teachers' Journal, Vol 130 No 4, 20 June 2025, page no 5.
As this Journal goes to print there are 21 days left until the nominal expiry date of the current certified agreement in the schools sector.
Members are aware that the current government wages policy will be insufficient to address the QTU’s claims. The policy offers just 8 per cent for a three-year agreement, which is worse than what the QTU received under the Newman government. Worse than that is the statement in the policy that any improvements to conditions or any other adjustment to salary classification structures etc need to be funded by the department — the government’s policy does not lend itself to anything other than salary increases.
Members know that if Queensland is to attract and retain teachers and school leaders in order to address the teacher shortage crisis, not only should our members be among the highest paid in the country, but our conditions should also be nation leading.
The current policy would see Queensland’s teachers and school leaders languishing as the fifth highest paid in the country. We know that, across the country, each state negotiates within a different timeframe and that by the end of our agreement there will be states that may have improved salaries beyond that which we achieve. However, when you apply the increases of 3 per cent, 2.5 per cent and 2.5 per cent to our current salaries, they do not even lift Queensland’s salaries ahead of those states who have already finalised agreements. Either the government is genuine in its election commitment to fix the teacher shortage crisis, or it is not.
In addition to nation leading salaries, we have also called for nation-leading conditions. However, to achieve this the government needs to be genuine in its negotiations and consultation regarding the review of school resourcing, which was conducted over the life of the current agreement. The significance of this it two-fold — firstly, how schools are resourced affects teaching conditions and consequently learning conditions; and secondly, with school leader salaries determined by resourcing levels in schools, whatever is implemented from the school resourcing review is directly connected to the remuneration of school leaders. At a time when we are witnessing fewer applications for principal roles, certainty in the resources they will have to work with — and in their level of remuneration — is imperative.
Add to this, when the Minister and Premier were encouraged to consider the continuation of some bespoke attraction and retention initiatives which are outside of the EB negotiations, but due to end as at 30 June (the rural and regional housing incentive payment) and the end of the year (the $20,000 payment across four years for beginning teachers working in TR4 and above schools in the four remote regions – Darling Downs South West, Central Queensland, North Queensland and Far North Queensland), neither the Minister or the Premier responded.
This inaction does not bode well for an offer or a package offer from the state government that meets the core elements of the QTU’s interests. It does not bode well for salary increases, attraction and retention incentives, or improved resourcing. Nor does it provide any insight into how the government intends to show its respect for our profession. How enhanced opportunities for intentional collaboration, mentoring and professional development, as well as stopping and preventing occupational violence in schools, will be achieved remain pivotal questions.
At a time when the department’s strategic plan includes workplace health and safety as a foundational principle, the absence of funding in the negotiations to support improved conditions that would bring this principle to light is gaping. It is not acceptable for certain behaviours to be considered a crime between the hours of 4pm and 8am, only for them to become “behaviour management issues” between 8am to 4pm when students are at school. If the government is truly going to address the crisis in education, it needs to address our members’ experience of occupational violence and aggression.
This EB provides the government with an important opportunity to deliver on its election commitments. While the government has reached an agreement that will see Queensland schools fully funded, our members cannot wait. Now is the time for the state government to stop hiding behind an inadequate government wages policy and deliver an EB that truly provides safe workplaces, improves resourcing, attracts and retains teachers and school leaders, and treats our members as professionals. Without an EB that provides nation-leading salaries and conditions, what is currently a crisis will become a catastrophe, one that our profession and our state cannot afford.