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I was going to just mention teachers going on strike, but decided to extend it to the external staff, i.e. dinner ladies (aka janitors?), lollipop men, cleaners and so on. Unison look after those people I believe.
What with the forces that were around such as the NUT, NASUWT, NAHT and other teaching unions, I have wondered whether teaching staff at least were a bit selfish and went on strike, and as a result, a closed school for at least one day.
Of course, in my day as a pupil in the system, I was a bit too young to know who the trade union bigwigs were at the time - I could just about understand names like Kinnock and Scargill from ITN bulletins, but that was about it. Ironically, I probably would have supported the trade unions as it meant an extra day off school in any case! Politics was a very obscure thing to a six year old back in 1984-1985 - the "Mr Whippy" Conservative Party logo looked a lot nicer than the pre-rose Labour flag logo did in any case when I watched News at 5.45 back then - I almost thought that Margaret Thatcher and the Queen were more or less the same person when I was younger! I knew hardly anything about it back then, and trade unions even less.
One Friday morning circa 1984-1985, the council workers (including school staff) were on strike, so instead of our local lollipop lady, we had a policeman guiding us across the main road. In hindsight, it made me think that the policeman would be a lot more useful to the community catching and arresting criminals in the inner-city area that I used to live in, and it would mean one less constable to do that job - as a result, I thought that the lollipop lady's actions was actually preventing the police officer from doing his proper job because of the strike, and I thought that was wrong. Since leaving the system, when it comes to school staff going on strike, I felt that the youngsters are the ones that felt the brunt of it at the end of the day.
Mind you, I have always been someone who is a near perfectionist and hates their routine being disrupted and causing anger and frustration in the process. As I said before, I often wished that my parents were up to the "Ask the Family" standard in academic qualifications so that I could opt out of the Mickey Mouse system and be home educated.
The big question: did anyone have days when there were no school open because the NASUWT or NUT were telling their members to go on strike over pay or whatever? And was it just like an extra day's holiday because of the strike? Were you too young to understand or get bothered about it in the first place?
What with the forces that were around such as the NUT, NASUWT, NAHT and other teaching unions, I have wondered whether teaching staff at least were a bit selfish and went on strike, and as a result, a closed school for at least one day.
Of course, in my day as a pupil in the system, I was a bit too young to know who the trade union bigwigs were at the time - I could just about understand names like Kinnock and Scargill from ITN bulletins, but that was about it. Ironically, I probably would have supported the trade unions as it meant an extra day off school in any case! Politics was a very obscure thing to a six year old back in 1984-1985 - the "Mr Whippy" Conservative Party logo looked a lot nicer than the pre-rose Labour flag logo did in any case when I watched News at 5.45 back then - I almost thought that Margaret Thatcher and the Queen were more or less the same person when I was younger! I knew hardly anything about it back then, and trade unions even less.
One Friday morning circa 1984-1985, the council workers (including school staff) were on strike, so instead of our local lollipop lady, we had a policeman guiding us across the main road. In hindsight, it made me think that the policeman would be a lot more useful to the community catching and arresting criminals in the inner-city area that I used to live in, and it would mean one less constable to do that job - as a result, I thought that the lollipop lady's actions was actually preventing the police officer from doing his proper job because of the strike, and I thought that was wrong. Since leaving the system, when it comes to school staff going on strike, I felt that the youngsters are the ones that felt the brunt of it at the end of the day.
Mind you, I have always been someone who is a near perfectionist and hates their routine being disrupted and causing anger and frustration in the process. As I said before, I often wished that my parents were up to the "Ask the Family" standard in academic qualifications so that I could opt out of the Mickey Mouse system and be home educated.
The big question: did anyone have days when there were no school open because the NASUWT or NUT were telling their members to go on strike over pay or whatever? And was it just like an extra day's holiday because of the strike? Were you too young to understand or get bothered about it in the first place?
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