Thousands of public school teachers are rallying outside of the Education Department’s building in Adelaide as almost 200 schools were closed down in the wake of budget cuts and deplorable working conditions.
The teachers — dressed in red — are protesting over a breakdown in negotiations with the South Australian Government over their new enterprise bargaining agreement.
Flinders Street has been blocked off to all traffic, with protesters making their way to the rally from all corners of the city.
Australian Education Union (AEU) SA president Howard Spreadbury said he was very happy with the number of teachers who joined the rally.
Salisbury High School teacher Adrian Mann said the State Government was focused on putting money into school infrastructure rather than programs for vulnerable students.
There’s been a lot talked about resourcing by those in Government but much of it seems to be about infrastructure and it’s all about what affects students in the classroom.
It just makes our future a lot more unsure and we really need teachers that are enthusiastic to stay around and actually have a permanent job and a future in our schooling system.
“While a number of schools will be closed, a number of other schools will be running modified programs because they’ll have skeleton staff because many of our members in those sites will be participating in the stop work action in the morning.
If in fact we don’t get a resolution out of this next little round of bargaining time then our executive will consider further action.
ABC Network Australia 2018.
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