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SUBMISSION
Migration and Population Review Panel Scrutiny Review - Migration Control Policy February 2021
- The NASUWT welcomes the opportunity to comment on the proposed changes to the Island's Migration Control Policy
- NASUWT - The Teachers' Union, represents teachers and headteachers across the United Kingdom and Crown Dependencies.
GENERAL COMMENTS
- The NASUWT would assert that Jersey's economy is almost entirely knowledge and skills based. The future prosperity of the Island is therefore wholly dependent on the quality of its education system.
- It has been widely accepted, including by such bodies as the OECD, that the quality of an education system cannot exceed the quality of its teachers.[1]
- The NASUWT would further assert that Jersey's education system is currently world-class, and therefore to maintain this status Jersey must be able to recruit and retain the highest quality teachers.
- The NASUWT notes that updates to population control measures are frequently considered in the context of changing economic and demographic conditions.
- Although the NASUWT accepts that it is necessary to have controls on the population, given the Island's small physical size, these should not come at the expense of providing high-quality public services.
- A coherent approach to population management is required to ensure the Island can successfully recruit key workers, including teachers, whilst also balancing land use and other demographic and economic issues.
SPECIFIC COMMENTS
- The Review Panel should be aware that recruitment of teachers in Jersey varies considerably by phase, with the majority of primary school teachers recruited locally, but the vast majority of secondary school teachers are recruited from off-island, predominantly from the United Kingdom.
- The Panel should also be aware that the United Kingdom is currently experiencing a teacher recruitment crisis, with the Department of Education missing its recruitment targets regularly for the last decade. Overall recruitment into secondary programmes in 2018/19 only met 78% of the total number of applicants identified as necessary by the DfE, down from 115% in 2010/11 .23
- The effects of this crisis have also been felt on Jersey, with difficulties in recruitment increasing year-on-year.
2 House of Commons Committee of Public Accounts (2018). Retaining and developing the teaching workforce: Seventeenth Report of Session 2017-19 (HC460).
3 DfE (2018a). Initial Teacher Training (ITT) Census for the academic year 2018 to 2019, England.
- In this context, the NASUWT is deeply concerned at any measures that would seek to hinder Jersey's ability to recruit teachers.
- The NASUWT has already provided substantial evidence through its pay claims of the substantial financial detractors which are hindering the recruitment of teachers. Put simply, Jersey teacher salaries are uncompetitive and do not take sufficient account of the cost of living.
- Despite this financial detriment many teachers do opt to take up roles on Jersey and often it is the higher quality of life that the island affords, particularly for those with children, that attracts teachers to the Island.
- Currently, teachers who are recruited from off-island are given licences which allow them to rent any local accommodation. This is for the term of their contracts but most have indefinite contracts and gain residency at 10 years.
- The NASUWT notes with alarm that the proposals put forward include the creation of long-term licences that do not lead to residential qualifications.
- The NASUWT is deeply concerned that if these were applied to teachers it would act as a further disincentive to recruitment, as teachers are less likely to undergo the upheaval of moving family etc. to the island if there is no ability to remain.
- This would then compound the existing financial disincentives and have a significant impact on Jersey's ability to recruit teachers, which, as stated above, is already under considerable strain.
- The NASUWT would also assert that this applies to other parts of the public sector, such as healthcare professionals.
- The NASUWT understands that there are already moves to classify teachers as key workers for the purposes of housing etc., and without seeing details the NASUWT has broadly welcomed this move.
- It makes perfect sense for key workers to continue to enjoy housing licences that lead to full residential qualification, and the NASUWT would urge for this provision to be stated explicitly.
- In the absence of Key Worker status being granted for teachers, the NASUWT would also urge the continuation of the current arrangements in regard of licences for teachers.
- In addition, any changes must not be retrospective, and any teachers who already hold licences that will lead to residential qualifications must be not be subject to detriment due to the adoption of new regulations.
Dr Patrick Roach General Secretary
For further information on the Union's response contact:
Wayne Bates
NASUWT
Hillscourt Education Centre Rose Hill
Rednal
Birmingham
B45 8RS
0121 453 6150 www.nasuwt.org.uk nasuwt@mail.nasuwt.org.uk