Last month, the New South Wales Teachers’ Federation (NSWTF) called a work stoppage meeting and imposed a deal on below-inflation wages and working conditions, which did not little or nothing to alleviate the intolerable working conditions of teachers.

The three-year award, which will affect 58,000 public school teachers in Australia’s most populous state, was agreed after behind-the-scenes discussions between the union and the state Labor government. In order to suppress opposition, a limited summary of what the union described as “significant improvements in teachers’ working conditions” was only released by the NSWTF executive less than two hours before teachers are invited to vote.

Discussions on teachers’ social media pages have focused on attempts to understand what these “improvements” mean in reality. A teacher has condemned the union’s “deviousness” in not presenting its recommendations to members before the stoppage meeting. If that had been the case, she said, “professionals could have had discussions like this to provide answers and clarification.”

WSWS journalists spoke to a number of public school teachers in New South Wales.

Miaa secondary school science teacher working in Sydney’s working-class western suburbs said: “A 3% pay rise is not enough, it doesn’t cover inflation.” We do not recognize that it is more and more difficult to teach students and that there is so much work that we cannot do it. One of the union’s “improvements,” the restriction to one-hour meetings after school hours, is simply not practical and is not enforced. Teachers have to work outside of working hours just to cope with the workload. It is up to school principals whether or not to allow the “flexible working arrangements” mentioned in the new award. I asked if I could work part time, and my manager said no because he couldn’t replace me.

“We are already missing a teacher, so science lessons are taught by teachers not trained in science. Other classes are not covered, so children are sent to the playground to be supervised. This has an impact on students. The constant disruptions and changes in staff, the occasional differences, this disrupts the children and we have noticed that the behavior is worse.

“Our staff room has an extra teacher absent for two weeks, his lessons, his grading, his report writing, all of this falls on already overworked staff.

“The NSWTF has caved. They could have fought harder to get a better deal. They are not aware of what is happening in schools.