Official Report: Minutes of Evidence

The Chairperson (Mr Mathison): I welcome you all to the Committee today. We are joined by Justin McCamphill from NASUWT, Mark McTaggart from the Irish National Teachers' Organisation (INTO), Stephen McCord from the Ulster Teachers' Union (UTU), Joanne Whyte from the National Association of Head Teachers (NAHT) and Bronagh Wright from the National Education Union (NEU). I hope that I got everybody's names there. If anyone wants to add anything to their intros, feel free to do so. You have all been here before, so I do not need to go through the format in any great detail. I am happy to hand over to you for some initial remarks of up to 10 minutes on the General Teaching Council Bill. If there is anything that you want to add about the more general education landscape and the issues that are relevant to your members, please feel free to do so. We will take questions after that, first on the Bill and then, time permitting, we will broaden it out. Thank you all for joining us, and I will hand over to you.

Mr Mark McTaggart (Irish National Teachers' Organisation): I will start by apologising for not having a briefing paper for you. We were fixated on other issues this week, with getting our pay offer and going out to our members to get that ratified. We do not have a briefing paper, but we will forward that at a later date. I apologise for that. I will hand over to Justin.

Mr Justin McCamphill (NASUWT): Thank you very much, Chair, for the invite. We are going to give our evidence on behalf of the Northern Ireland Teachers' Council (NITC) inasmuch as is possible. We exist as the negotiating body for teachers in relation to pay and conditions, but there may be some areas, when it comes to policy matters, where we will diverge slightly. If I get anything wrong, it is because we got the invite only a few days ago.

As a whole, however, the NITC supports the concept of an independent professional body for teachers, but that is not what is in this legislation. We believe that it is regrettable that a situation was allowed to persist for over 20 years where everyone knew that the legislation was flawed. We knew that it prevented the regulation of the profession in the manner that was originally intended. Where a body is not doing what it was meant to do, that is part of the reason for the dysfunction that was there before. I am not going to delve into that, however.

We believe that legislation is necessary, because there are safeguarding risks for children and young people if it does not happen. We also think that there is more than one way of achieving that policy objective. We agree that whatever approach is taken, the core functions as highlighted in the legislation are required. We need to establish and maintain a register of teachers. We need to approve qualifications for the purpose of registration, and we need to regulate the teaching profession.

At the moment, the reality is that the current General Teaching Council (GTC) is operating directly under the direction of the Department in a more effective way than in its previous manifestations. That is regrettable, when you think back on the past. However, the NITC believes that the General Teaching Council Bill will still leave the GTC operating under the direction of a Minister, which means that it will not be independent or representative of the profession. Teachers already ask why they have to pay for a body that is not fully functional. They will find it hard to stomach paying for a non-departmental public body in future. Calling it a council gives the impression that it will have some decision-making powers, whereas it will have nothing of the sort. The Bill is unambiguous: the new GTCNI will simply carry out the Minister's wishes. If the Committee believes that that is the way to go, it should at least remove the requirement for teachers to pay for it.

I will run through the clauses to give our views. On clause 1, if the body were independent, we would agree with the requirement to remove people from certain groups or certain interests, but there are nuances around that. We certainly have an issue with employer reps and such people being on a professional body for teachers because that is not what happens in other bodies. There is a range of views among us on whether teachers should be elected generally or should come from different groups, such as primary, post-primary and special education.

We profoundly disagree with the removal of elections. In most other professional bodies, half the members are appointed and half are elected. The Bill removes that entirely. The argument that is used is that teachers elected the wrong people, but, to be honest, that is not a good argument.

Clauses 2 to 4 do not seem contentious. They allow the GTC to make provisions around its own rules.

On clause 5, I am cautious about how far GTCNI is allowed to delegate its functions within the organisation without referral to the board.

Clause 6 amends the legislation that allows GTCNI to remunerate its members. People who give up their time should get out-of-pocket expenses. If a teacher is appointed, substitute cover would be provided at the full rate for a public appointment, so it is not necessary to provide payments for the people who will be on the body.

Clause 7 clarifies the fact that the Department has the power to make regulations relating to the registration of teachers. That is needed. For example, GTCNI could provisionally register persons with minor deficiencies. As unions, we are all aware that people coming from other jurisdictions may fall a couple of weeks short in the time that they have spent under supervised placement. Having an agreed system in place that would allow that to be rectified is good.

Clause 8 is more problematic, as we do not know what mechanism GTCNI would use for the re-registration of teachers. Other professional bodies have systems whereby members of the body provide a sample of professional learning or work. We want clarity that that would be distinct from the employment relationship. There is a fear, which may be unfounded, that a person's employer could make that decision, whereas it should be the person's professional body. The Bill is a bit open-ended about what might happen, so we would prefer to have clarity. Teachers already submit records of continuing professional development (CPD) to their employer through a scheme called performance review and staff development (PRSD), and that information could be used by the professional body. Obviously, the decision-making would have to lie separately.

Clause 9 is interesting, because it gives the Department the power to set out in regulations "any matter" relating to the registration of teachers that will be required or authorised to include in its rules. I say that that is interesting because it makes clear that GTCNI is entirely subservient to the Department. If that is the case, it is not morally justifiable to ask teachers to pay for it.

Clause 10 is on penalties for someone who pretends to be a teacher. There is no issue with that clause.

Clause 11 is a big change from the current position. It is about the types of case that GTC can look at. We know that there will be challenges with that. It is important, especially in cases of serious disciplinary matters for which somebody would have been dismissed, that a look is taken at whether the person is capable of teaching or should be allowed to teach. Again, matters of competency can be difficult. Sometimes, a person may be judged to be incompetent for reasons beyond their control, including for medical reasons. That is not covered in the legislation, and I know that it will be dependent on subsequent regulation, but I would like some information on how it will work.

Clause 12 relates to fees and charges. We believe that those charges should be removed, because we think that the fact that clause 11 widens the scope, in conjunction with the fact that it will be directed by the Department, means that we could end up with a situation in which fees escalate out of control for a body that is carrying out functions for the Department.

As regards the rest of the Bill, we have no issues with clauses 13 to 16. We have no issues with how the Order is defined or with the Bill's title. The other witnesses can think about whether I have missed something, but, overall, if it is not an independent body, we do not believe that teachers should pay for it.

The Chairperson (Mr Mathison): Do any other witnesses wish to come in at this stage? You are happy to move to questions. OK.

I will start at the start of the Bill and the issue of whether membership is by election or appointment. I understand the concerns around ensuring that the council is representative of the teaching profession. When we heard from the Department — I have also found this from my engagement with education stakeholders — its representatives were quite clear that there is a sense that the previous iteration of the council ground to a halt because it effectively became an industrial relations forum rather than a professional body for regulating the teaching profession. Do you have any concerns that a push for an elected model might recreate the problems of the past? Can you see a way through that?

Mr McCamphill: The only way we could get around that would be if there were an independent body. That would involve taking a step back to look at how independent bodies for other professions work. In the past, we have looked to Scotland. Scotland has a very successful independent body, but that has been in the firmament of the Scottish education system for so long that I do not think such a body could not be created overnight, yet that is what we tried to do when we should have been looking at what other professional bodies such as the Law Society and organisations for barristers, pharmacists, engineers and so on do. Those tend to be smaller bodies in which people from the public and representing the public interest hold to account those who are elected. GTC did it the other way round, whereby people coming from an employer perspective pushed the work, and the elected people criticised them, sometimes very loudly. That should have been the other way round: they should have been saying, "Guys, it is your job to develop the competencies for teachers. We are here to make sure that you do that".

Ms Bronagh Wright (National Education Union): It is important that the body reflects the service that it is standing up for and to which it is accountable. Those people need to be from across the whole education sector in Northern Ireland if they are to represent those sectors confidently and with their trust. We have not had that in the past. That is very important, especially in my area of interest, which is underachieving young people and teachers who work with them. It is important that the body reflects the education system and services across Northern Ireland.

The Chairperson (Mr Mathison): Is your assessment that a body that is elected from the teacher side would be more representative than a body that arose from appointment? Is that your clear position?

Ms Wright: Yes.

Mr McCamphill: Again, that would work only in the context of an independent body, because, if the only role of that body is to implement the will of the Department, it does not matter how its members are appointed. The bigger thing is the independence of the body.

The Chairperson (Mr Mathison): I will ask a wider question arising from the discussion. Is there a fundamental concern with the premise of the legislation? Do you think that the Minister should essentially have done something different? Do you think that he should have created an independent body and not tweaked the structures?

Mr McCamphill: Yes. He had different options open to him. He could have gone for the independent-body route, or the Department could have done it, but that is not what we want, or there could be some sort of agency. Whatever he picks, there should still be consultation, and he should listen to the profession. With the current body, it does not add up that you can say that it is independent. To be fair, it is not saying that it is independent, but it should be.

The Chairperson (Mr Mathison): Those are issues that we can pick up with the Department when we hear from it. I want to pick up on a number of clauses. You highlighted clause 9 and clause 11 in particular. Your concerns around clause 9 are that it is very open-ended and that, effectively, the Department can require the council to do anything that it wishes in future regulations. I will note that at this stage. I want to raise with the Department what sort of things it foresees the council doing that might arise out of clause 9. It might be better to put that in the Bill and be transparent about it. That would be my first question.

Clause 11 raised some concerns. I want to hear a bit more detail from you on that. It sets out a detailed schedule of investigatory and disciplinary powers that will be conferred on the GTCNI, but the schedule's wording is that the provisions "may" be provided for by regulations. Does that create a lack of clarity as to whether those are going to be the powers?

Mr McCamphill: Yes, it does. The Department's argument is that it is future-proofing it. While I understand that from a procedural point of view, the profession deserves clarity as to what it will be.

The Chairperson (Mr Mathison): The flip side to that — there are two sides of the same coin — is that we could, potentially, have the new body established without its investigatory or disciplinary powers being clarified, which would create uncertainty. I do not think that would be helpful.

Mr McCamphill: The lesson learned from the past is that, because GTC never got to the regulating, it ended up with the two easy bits, and it still made a hames of it. We have had 20 years of that, and we need to make sure that that does not happen again.

The Chairperson (Mr Mathison): Across the Committee, there will be a strong interest in getting that right because it went so wrong previously. It is important that we consider it in detail. I might come back in at the end if there is something that I wanted to raise that is not covered by other members, but I will pass over to the Deputy Chair, and if other members are interested in coming in, they can indicate through the Clerk.

Mr Sheehan: The Education Minister has been keen to link the proposed new GTC with teacher professional learning. Alan Boyd from the Department said:

What are the teaching unions' views on that? Is there a workload implication? Has the Department engaged with the unions on that?

Mr McCamphill: The Department has engaged but has not outlined exactly what that might look like. You could say that there is a model that takes the existing PRSD model that is already happening, and that would be relatively workload free. However, there also could be something new that teachers would have no control over. If you look at the language, it says "participation", so that implies that somebody will have to provide. We do not want the situation where teachers are being legislated to take part in something that their employer is not providing.

In other models, in other jurisdictions, it is built into the contract that it is within contractual time, and the resources are provided. We have no objection to teachers taking part in teacher professional learning. They need to reflect on their practice as a teacher, but it has to be done in such a way that the work is manageable. It should not be open-ended and should be split from the employer's function.

Ms Joanne Whyte (National Association of Head Teachers): It also needs to be relevant. A whole programme of teacher professional learning (TPL) is being rolled out at the moment by the Department, but none of it so far is something that I, as a principal, have thought I must get everyone to do. A whole programme of TPL is available in my school, as would be the case in every other school, but it is relevant to the school and the children that it serves. It is not relevant, perhaps, to what someone else thinks educationalists should be.

Our concern is that it will become a tick-box exercise, where you have people spending their professional time watching videos or attending things that are not relevant or appropriate for their practice in their school. We would like to see that much better explained. We think that there should be a connection, of course, but what does that actually mean? If you have attended every meeting and every training course available in your school that year, does that mean that it is OK?

Mr Sheehan: Are you saying that there is a lot of TPL available that is not relevant to the job the teacher is doing?

Ms Whyte: It might be relevant to some people in some schools, but it would not be relevant to all. In my context, nothing has been offered as yet that is relevant. What we have looked to do has not been offered by the Education Authority (EA) or in any of the Department's offerings. That really needs to be narrowed down because there would be nothing worse than expecting people to waste their time on something that they are not going to use or that will not benefit the children.

Mr Sheehan: If it is the case that some of the TPL is not relevant, and therefore a teacher decides that there is no point in doing it, would that affect their career pathway?

Ms Whyte: We would not like to think so, because it should be up to the school that the teacher works in to decide what is relevant and what their TPL will be. Obviously, through PRSD, teachers can say, "I have an interest in this, or I would really like to go and do this." That would be considered part of their personal target in their PRSD. You have people going down all different alleyways that, in the end, are going to broaden what you can offer in your school, but that is a personal interest of theirs. Instead of doing that, they are having to do something about teaching French at Key Stage 2, for example, because that is the official TPL offering.

Mr Sheehan: You are just ticking a box by doing that.

Ms Whyte: Yes, it is a waste of time.

Mr McCamphill: I think one of the issues is the bureaucracy that would be required. That, again, comes back to the issue of what the fee structure would end up looking like. There are simple ways of doing it. You could have samples etc, but then you also could have a bureaucracy where someone is checking on every person, and the next thing is that 20 people are employed just to keep an eye on teachers. That is not what we want, and, again, if it is all going to be directed by the Minister, teachers should not have to pay for it.

Mr McTaggart: With regard to TPL, who is going to deliver it will be very important, because teachers have to feel that it is relevant, but it has to be effective for them as well. When the EA came in at first, a huge amount of professional development was available, but it was cut back and cut back. The EA's function now is not so much about delivering training for teachers. Schools are now being asked to look outside for people to come in, so they will have to figure out what qualifications they have. Where a school has not been able to deliver TPL, there is a danger that teachers, through this scheme, will be negatively impacted because the necessary training was not available. Those teachers will not have the evidence in their folder — however it is recorded — that they have had TPL and that it was delivered properly. There is an issue about who is going to fund that, because we are already being told, from the letters that come out this week from Ronnie Armour, not to bring substitute or supply teachers in, so when are teachers expected to do it? Will it be within their working hours, or will they be expected to do it outside their working time? There are a number of issues, and until it has been agreed with the trade union, we are going to have to be very conscious of the fact that TPL has to be effective, but it also has to be funded properly.

Mr Sheehan: I have one other question. As an MLA, I have made representations on behalf of a number of young, newly qualified teachers who are having difficulty getting registered because they qualified in the South or across the water. Are you familiar with such cases? Would the unions be supportive of an amendment to the legislation that would remove barriers to the recognition of qualifications?

Mr McCamphill: Absolutely. They have got better at that, but it is still not perfect. One of the issues is that, while local institutions are pre-approved, if you come from somewhere else, you are asked, after you have got your qualification, to prove that it meets the requirements. As a union, we know the institutions outside of here from which young people are sent. The GTC knows that, too; it will know the top 10 institutions. The GTC should be looking at pre-approving those courses so that, at least, you would be left with only a small number of institutions to deal with. The reality is that the majority of external providers are in the north-west of England. I think that it should be easy to speak to those institutions, and, if courses do not change year-on-year, to make it quicker to approve them.

Ms Wright: There should be a little bit of caution around some things that are happening. We can look at teacher training in England and, perhaps, some other countries, but we have a very high standard in Northern Ireland. There needs to be accountability for those who come to teach, and want to teach, in Northern Ireland. That is very important. It should be regulated so that we are not diffusing excellence within certain subject areas or sectors where teachers are working. It is important to think about that.

The Chairperson (Mr Mathison): Are you alluding to the international PGCE (iPGCE) model — the Coventry model? Is that of concern among your members?

Mr McCamphill: We have a concern that that came in with little prior warning. For anyone who does not know, an international PGCE is offered in four universities in England. It was originally intended for students who were going to work abroad. For some reason, it has been allowed in Northern Ireland, and, now, those universities are marketing themselves as teacher-training providers for Northern Ireland. That came about without any proper consultation with the profession here. GTC Scotland decided not to allow them. We are not talking about the traditional universities in England; it is those that are doing it online. Questions have been raised. That does not necessarily mean that they are not good courses, but there should have been more scrutiny of their introduction here.

Mr Sheehan: What about North/South?

Mr McCamphill: The people who come from the South seem to have a lot more hurdles and have to wait for a lot longer. That seems to defy logic, given that their course is twice as long.

Mr Sheehan: Is there a need for the same level of caution about people who qualify in the South, Bronagh?

Ms Wright: It is about excellence; it is about the best. That is what we want. We want really high standards.

Mr Sheehan: I am asking for your opinion based on your knowledge of the people who qualify in the South and come to the North.

Mr McCamphill: I would say no, because, in the South, there is not a free-for-all with providers. In the South, qualifications are regulated tightly by the Government. That does not mean that the body should not interrogate each of the courses in the South, but I cannot see it being a problem.

Ms Whyte: One of the clauses contains what is almost a breathing period whereby there would be a cautionary acceptance of the course, and then you would have to prove your worth, relevant to the GTC guidelines. That is perfect for the like of the Coventry iPGCE. I have had experience of the Coventry iPGCE. It is attracting the type of people who I think we should be attracting into the teaching workforce. They are people who are working in education and have a degree — it is not that they do not have a degree — but cannot afford to do a full-time teaching course. A lot of them have young families and cannot go away to do a course. The fees for the Coventry iPGCE are doable, if people have saved for them. There are people working in my school who are on that course, and it is rigorous. It contains a lot more teaching practice. There is a lot of work for the school in mentoring, monitoring and having meetings with the university. I backed those people to do the course because I knew that they would make excellent teachers, and they are currently in that process. I agree with you, but, if there is a pause, whereby those people can be cautiously registered and allowed to teach and then prove the rest, that will cover any difficulties that we may have with the other courses.

Ms Wright: That is the employed route. Caution is necessary with that, because we would not want a diffusion of subject areas or specialisms. It has the potential to do that, so it needs to be looked at rigorously.

Mr Sheehan: Yes. I accept the need for caution, but the level of bureaucracy has set the bar far too high.

Ms Wright: We need to think about the potential of what might come after that.

Mr Sheehan: OK.

Mr Stephen McCord (Ulster Teachers' Union): It is important to have the standards there. I have been in touch with people who have not been able to register with GTCNI, even though some of them have taught in other countries for many years and have a degree and a teaching qualification in those countries. They find transferring the qualification to this country difficult, because they do not have qualified teacher status (QTS). It is important that we get GTCNI back up, so that the decisions can be made to get those people into the workforce.

The Chairperson (Mr Mathison): There are some nuances in your positions, but, effectively, you are saying that we need to be cautious to ensure high quality, but that we should also build in flexibility, particularly across jurisdictions. In some cases, teachers from a jurisdiction a few miles down the road struggle to register. We hear that, and we can follow up on some of it with the Department.

I am giving a wee bit of latitude with time, because there is not unlikely to be a huge number of evidence sessions on the Bill, and it will be helpful to unpick it as much as we can with witnesses other than those from the Department.

Mr Brooks: In many ways, we have moved past the Bill and to a very substantial issue. I want to check something with Joanne. I am aware that you are the principal of a SEN school. As regards concerns about TPL, you said that there is nothing relevant. Is the concern specifically about things not being relevant for SEN schools, given the specialised training that they need? Is there less concern across the profession generally?

Ms Whyte: It is certainly more noticeable in SEN schools, David. I will give you an example. Many years ago, we did phonics training — the very basics of learning to read — with staff. We got new staff in, and they had not done that before. I went on to look for phonics training. You would think that that would be instantly available, but there were no courses and none planned for that academic year. Those are basic standards. When the education and library boards (ELBs) became the EA, and, as Mark said, the training was diminished and cut, the subject specialisms were lost. When you look for basic subject training from the Education Authority, you find that it is non-existent. You can come out of teacher training college and know how to teach phonics, but do you really know phonics inside out, whereby you have six different strategies to do the one thing, or do you just know what Stranmillis University College or St Mary's University College told you? That more in-depth knowledge of the basics is missing in TPL.

Mr Brooks: We have been grappling with phonics ourselves. [Laughter.]

The Chairperson (Mr Mathison): "Grappling" is probably the right word. TransformED and some the CPD stuff arises from that. There is a range of views around whether the focus on the science of learning is really what teachers need practically. Again, if there is a big push towards just what the Department provides, that may not actually meet the needs on the ground. That is noted.

Mr Baker: Thank you. It has been very informative. It is fair to say that the Minister is moving at quite a fast pace. If you ask me, working fast does not mean working well. Just before Christmas, I did a wee visit of all of the schools in the area that I represent and sat down with the school leaders to hear about the challenges that they face. A recurring theme was their concern about the amount of consultations that are coming through; the speed of the change; and the fact that, because they have so much other work to do, they are not getting to feed into those consultations properly. Is that a sentiment across the board, beyond what I picked up from that small sample?

Mr McCamphill: It is. A lot of the consultations also take place outside the school sector, so that may be a reflection of their feeling that they cannot make their voice heard in those consultations.

Mr Baker: The changes that they see coming down the track may have ramifications and repercussions for a generation to come. That is the seriousness of the changes.

Mr McCamphill: Yes, and I should say that what is being done is not all bad.

Mr McTaggart: The issue is that, when things have been brought in before, it has been done at a slightly slower pace than what is being expected now. Schools have not been told what is going to be taken out to allow the new stuff to come in. That is the problem. Schools have a huge workload, and there is an understanding that, through TransformED, things will change, but it is the pace of change that is the problem. Principals are going to TransformED meetings and coming back slightly deflated, because they are worried about the pace and whether they will be able to implement all of those things. We agree with most of the things that are coming in through TransformED. The issue is not that they are being brought in but the pace at which they are being brought in. Again, when and how will the training take place? I mentioned the letter from Ronnie Armour and Richard Pengelly that talked about trying to restrict the amount of supply teaching that schools pay for. How will the training be done if you cannot bring in supply teachers to let it take place? There are all of those things. The pace probably needs to slow to embed it properly. There is nothing worse than rushing through something that is good but finding, when it comes in, that it is not embedded and seeing it fall by the wayside like everything else.

Mr Baker: It is fair to say that it is coming in fast.

Mr McTaggart: It is. There is an expectation that it will come through quickly.

Mr Baker: You mentioned TransformED. I am not jumping up and down about it, but I am deeply concerned about the removal of AS levels and coursework. When we had officials from the Department in recently, they referred to the dangers of AI almost as a justification to take coursework away. I think that that is really unfair on our young people. They should be at the front and centre of everything that we do, and it seems very clear, from the young people who I talk to, that they are not. Are you picking that up from school leaders?

Mr McCamphill: AI is definitely a factor.

Mr Baker: But it should not be a justification to remove the coursework aspect.

Mr McCamphill: No. With coursework, there is also controlled assessment. We need to look at where that is most appropriate. I am not necessarily saying what the answer is, but, for some subjects, it may be better to have more exam assessment than it is for others. When you are measuring skills — in subjects such as technology — you will want teacher input. That is what, I think, has led to a lot of problems in and around bureaucracy: ensuring standards can lead to a lot of dissatisfaction among teachers.

Mr Baker: I have probably moved away from what you are here to talk about today. Apologies for that.

Mr McCamphill: Once the Minister started on the curriculum, it followed that he had to start to do all of the other things. If you have a curriculum, you have to assess it. If you change how you teach and assess, you have to change your qualifications. There will be an element of speed, but he has to make sure that schools are resourced to make the change that he wants to make. Ultimately, in a democratic system, politicians decide these things.

Mr Baker: This will be my last question. Pat alluded to possible amendments. The previous — and first — piece of legislation that I was involved with on the Education Committee was the School Uniforms Bill, and the vast majority — 90% — of our amendments were thrown in the bin. We did not get them debated in the Chamber. We could work really hard on this Bill and bring forward amendments, and the Speaker could do the exact same thing. To be fair, the School Uniforms Bill ended up being 99·9% the Minister's Bill. There was very little input from Members. If that were to be the case with this Bill, would you be happy with it going through as is?

Mr McCamphill: No.

Ms Wright: You need to remember that, at the minute, the workforce has trust issues with organisations. It is a workforce that sometimes says, "No, I don't need to do that" or, "Maybe I shouldn't do that", or it might ask, "Why am I doing that? What is the benefit to the young people? How will that make things better for the team or the school?". Teachers are quite focused on a lot of that, which is good, but we need to build trust. You need to build trust and the Education Minister needs to build trust, and, given the pace at which these things are going through, I am not sure that that is happening.

Mr Baker: I agree with you. Trust needs to be built among us as well. I will use the School Uniforms Bill as an example. We were probably never going to completely block it because that would not be understood, but the reality is that we could have made it a very good piece of legislation but did not get the chance. Thank you.

The Chairperson (Mr Mathison): I remind members that we will have the chance to open this out into broader issues, but, for now, we should keep as focused as we can on the Bill so that we get through the agenda.

Mr Burrows: It is not often that I agree with Danny, but, yes, I get feedback about the pace of change, even from head teachers and teachers who are positive about some of the changes and the amount of consultation.

I have quite a few questions. Some teachers have contacted me about discipline, and I have used my background as head of the PSNI discipline branch. Is there a concern that, with the new legislation, boards of governors will not be able to deal with minor conduct issues and minor performance issues swiftly and proportionately?

Mr McCamphill: No. That is not an issue at all with this. We have lots of other complaints, but that is not one. Schools' internal processes will still run. Ideally, they should be running through. If you get to the point where somebody is in front of the GTC, that will be when they have been found to have reached the bar for dismissal or thereabouts. It should have gone through an internal process first. Otherwise, the GTC would not cope with the thousands of complaints.

Mr Burrows: OK. I just hope that that proportionality is embedded and stays. You have covered the membership fee. Are you content that, at any stage of the disciplinary procedures, the teacher will still be able to contact a teaching union for assistance and representation?

Mr McCamphill: Yes, that will not be an issue either. In parallel bodies, the person will have union representation and legal representation, if required, in front of the panels. I do not think that that will be an issue.

Mr Burrows: OK. I have been campaigning for the right to wear coats to school. If a young person is going to school, a teacher should not be standing at the gate saying, "You're not allowed to wear a coat", either because the school does not have an official coat or because the coat that the young person is wearing is not the branded school coat. Do you support children being able to wear —?

Mr McTaggart: Yes. Children should go to school feeling comfortable and safe. They could be going into school in the freezing cold and having to wear a particular blazer as opposed to a proper coat that their family bought for them. There is no reason why children should not come into school feeling safe and warm. If you come to school freezing cold, it will take you about half an hour before you are ready to start learning. It is about simple things like that. There is no reason why not.

Ms Wright: I do not believe that any child should be challenged about whatever coat they are wearing.

Mr Burrows: I agree that they should be allowed to wear a coat. We are nearly there with the draft school uniform guidelines. That has been included, but I just want to clarify it and get it more hammered down, so that it is a clear legal right.

The next one is a practical one for schools. Some pupils tell me, "I would bring a coat if it were allowed, but one of the problems is that I've nowhere to store the coat. I've nowhere to hang it. I'm forced to walk around with a big, bulky coat under my arm, so I choose not to bring it". Do you support the view that not only should every child be able to wear a coat to school but they should have somewhere to hang the thing?

Mr McCamphill: Yes.

Mr McTaggart: Yes.

Ms Wright: Yes.

Mr Burrows: OK. this is really easy. It is easier than the last time, when we discussed inspections. With regard to the general budget, the bigger picture and the dire financial situation that is faced by the Department, if you were charged with finding savings in order to give teachers their pay awards, where would you find those savings?

Mr McCord: It will be very difficult to find savings. Schools, over many years, have already cut back everything that they can. There is so little there from which to make any more savings, Jon.

Mr Burrows: I have been going round schools. I actually made two visits this morning. I always ask about procurement. I say, "Look, if you wanted to get that wall painted, what would you pay for a procured service?". They typically give me a figure that is three and a half times what they could pay a local tradesperson to do it. I know that there are issues — you have to ensure that you have the right people, vetting and all that — but I think that the public are being ripped off. I spoke to one principal who had to get a flagstone fixed — one flagstone that was cracked — because someone could trip on it. It cost £500 to replace one flagstone. I queried that. I asked, "Are you sure that you had to pay that?". The procured service was £500. Do you think that we are being ripped off with procurement?

Ms Wright: Yes.

Mr McCamphill: I think that there are different views on that, Jon. The important thing is finding out the facts. The Committee should probably look at that, because people in the EA will say, "Hold on, there are swings and roundabouts in this. For example, we are getting cheap oil for all schools". It would definitely be worth delving into that and finding out what is going on.

Mr Burrows: I have one last question. You mentioned TPL. Again, I have been speaking to schools, and they tell me that getting sub teachers on any basis is sometimes very difficult. They log on to whatever it is, and there are very few sub teachers available. With things like the curriculum review, I am told that many principals — there are two points here — first, do not want to release anybody for training, because they have to release them for up to 20 days, and they just cannot afford to lose a teacher for 20 days. I feel that the 20 days is excessive. Secondly, when they try to get sub teachers, they log on to the system, and there is just none available. Do you recognise those two issues?

The Chairperson (Mr Mathison): Can you answer briefly? We are well off track from the Bill.

Mr Burrows: It is just because you mentioned TPL.

Ms Wright: Teaching unions are doing an awful lot of work to ensure that the workload, teachers' pay and everything else are improving to keep teachers in Northern Ireland. We need to do a lot more work on that in Northern Ireland to keep those teachers and make teaching in Northern Ireland attractive.

Mr McCamphill: That supply pool is obviously very important for the proper functioning of the system. Quite often, teachers feel underappreciated. It is not about the Northern Ireland substitute teacher register system; it is about people deciding whether they want to work as supply teachers when there are opportunities elsewhere that pay more money or offer longer continuity of work.

Mr Burrows: I will just finish on that, but I will say one other thing while you are all here. I still speak to teachers who are getting badly injured at school. We all need to focus on that. Today, I was at a primary school where teachers have been elbowed in the throat. It is not about blaming the children, but we have teachers being injured. We need to ensure that they have all the training and support that they need. I will mention one thing that I will write to the EA about. I have asked teachers and principals —.

The Chairperson (Mr Mathison): Can you bring your remarks to a close, Jon?

Mr Burrows: These are my final remarks. I have asked teachers and principals whether, when a teacher is assaulted — well, injured — anyone in the EA contacts them. They said no. You can put in a form to say that you have had your nose or teeth broken, and nobody ever picks up the phone to say, "That was awful". I just wanted to put that on the public record.

The Chairperson (Mr Mathison): Thanks, Jon. Michelle had indicated next.

Mrs Guy: Thanks, Chair. Can I clarify: will you be going round us again for other questions, or will I ask all mine now?

The Chairperson (Mr Mathison): Members are opening up the discussion way beyond the scope of the Bill. If you have already asked questions that are outside the scope of the Bill —.

Mr McCamphill: Some of us are limited for time.

The Chairperson (Mr Mathison): Yes. We are at risk of being pushed for time. I am happy to bring in anyone who has stuck to the Bill in their questioning for final questions. It is entirely up to you how you use your time from here on in. We are here to scrutinise the Bill, and it is important that we do that.

Mrs Guy: OK. First, on the Bill, you explained that you did not have time to give us a briefing, and that is fine; I am not chastising you for that. However, the Department was in for a session, which forms part of our notes. It suggested that there had been a lot of engagement on the Bill and that it had been quite positive, although you had a few concerns, so I was a bit taken aback by the response today.

Mr McCamphill: No, I think that it mistook civility for agreement. [Laughter.]

Mrs Guy: I do not know what to do with that.

You were very equivocal that the Bill will not do. I genuinely was not expecting you to be quite as definite about that.

The disciplinary stuff is really important to all of this, obviously. Are you clear from what is there now about how that disciplinary process is going to work and, in particular, the kind of timescales that will be in place?

Mr McCamphill: No, that is not clear. Jon asked about what happens in schools. That will not change, but, in terms of how it is going to work in that body, that will need subsequent regulation and decisions to be made.

Mrs Guy: Do you have anything at this point that you want to say about how long you would want —?

Mr McCamphill: We think that the vast majority of cases should go to the GTC only after the school has fulfilled its processes. It is possible that a school will refuse to engage in any process, despite something very serious having happened, but bigger questions should then be asked about that school. On the whole, we do not want a system where a member of the public can say, "Well, when I was in school 10 years ago, this happened". It should be to the school first to follow its disciplinary procedures.

Mrs Guy: You have been very clear that there is an issue of trust in all this; ultimately, what is proposed here will be the Department controlling it. What if the content overall were in the hands of someone whom you considered to be independent? You have pulled out stuff for us that you are happy with. Would that give you more comfort?

Mr McCamphill: It would if it were genuinely independent. There are other models out there, quite often with an independent chair from outside the sector who keeps everyone on track. I have been on the teachers' pension scheme pension board, which has a policy of having an independent chair who is not on either side but makes sure that everyone does what they are meant to do. That can work very well.

Mrs Guy: I will move to issues that are outside the scope of the Bill. I am kind of concerned that Jon has my papers, because he asked about a lot of stuff that I have in them. I have something about assaults in school, which I will focus on because Jon has raised it already. I received some figures on that via a question for written answer. The breakdown of assaults in schools was, understandably, higher in special schools. We understand the circumstances there. In mainstream schools, there were 288 assaults on staff, 181 of which were in primary school. There were only six in post-primary school. What is your assessment of that? Is that just an under-reporting? If that is the case, why are people under-reporting in post-primary school?

Mr McCamphill: Clearly, there is under-reporting. I was hoping that this question would come up. In 2011, the teachers' negotiating committee (TNC) agreed a policy whereby schools and employing authorities would report. We are still waiting, 15 years later, for that to happen. It is happening in EA special schools, which have very good compliance, probably because they are dealing with so many. However, we are not getting the full picture in primary. I suspect that a lot of the primary figures are now coming from specialist provision in mainstream schools (SPiMS). It does not stack up to say that there were only six in the whole of post primary.

We have a TNC agreement in place, but the employers are not following it. We know that the EA, for example, has spent the past three or four years trying to come up with a policy. We have made our views known that the one in draft is not fit for purpose. Our big concern has been that trade union health and safety reps have to be consulted by any employer. Up to now, the EA has been refusing to put that in its guidance. If that does not happen, we will not actually address what is happening in schools.

Mrs Guy: That is very concerning. I am sure that you are concerned for your members on that front. Do you have any sense of how serious those assaults are? How many go to prosecution?

Mr McCamphill: I would say that very few go to prosecution because it is probably that the majority are happening where children do not have the capacity to understand that it is an assault, but assaults that meet that definition do occur as well. If we never get a proper baseline, we will never know whether things are improving or getting worse. If we get more schools to comply, the numbers will go up next year, and you might even have headlines saying that the numbers are up; but until everyone complies, we will not know.

Mrs Guy: I want to be cautious, but the numbers show a rise from 790 to over 3,500. There is a complexity in that picture, and it is reasonable that that should be accurately reflected.

Ms Wright: When you think about recording numbers, it may be useful to look at repeat incidents by the same person, how that is being managed, how that young person is being supported and how the staff are being supported and trained. Those are the sorts of things that we should be able to look at in this day and age. All school sectors in Northern Ireland look at that and try to support the young person and the staff as best they can to make sure that a crisis does not happen. It is about that repeating nature of things and being out of control and not being able to be controlled or supported when everything is —.

Mr McCamphill: That highlights the fact that you have legislation that says that health and safety reps have to be consulted on risk assessments, but it is not happening, and the EA is not prepared to put that to paper. That is a problem.

Ms Whyte: There is also an issue of age. Primary-school kids get very distressed and dysregulated, and they just kill dead things around them. In post-primary settings — I have worked in both — there would be more of their telling you to eff off and walking away, because they are more in control of themselves than those in primary, so there is a bit of that in there as well.

Mrs Guy: Thank you, folks.

Ms Hunter: Thank you so much to the panel for being here. We love to hear directly from you.

I will go a bit out of scope as well with two opinion questions. One of them pertains to point 8 of the 10-point plan. Previously, I asked for clarification on how educational disadvantage is defined, and it is predominantly around children who receive free school meals and maternal educational attainment, which is how much education the mother of the family had received. I felt strongly that that neglected to understand the different needs of our young people today and the trauma that they experience in the home, with things such as domestic violence and addiction in the home. I would love to hear your perspective on point 8 of the 10-point plan and how educational disadvantage is defined. Perhaps you could also share some testimonies of your experience of working in education and whether there is anything that, you think, we can do to beef up that definition a bit to help every child in the best way that we can.

Ms Wright: My background is 15 years in the education other than at school (EOTAS) service at post-primary Key Stage 4. We talk about trust and valuing areas of education, but we have an Education Authority that is outlining cost-cutting measures for some of the most vulnerable young people in Northern Ireland who are at the end of their educational journey. They are at a point where they will get real support that will change their life. Something like 87% of those young people change their life, but they are being targeted now. That is not on: I totally disagree with it. It is happening because people do not understand what services do. We are starting to deplete the services for disadvantaged young people in Northern Ireland, who will cost you a huge amount of money going forward — services that will change their lives and make them have a plan, pursue a career and be valued members of our society. It is completely wrong that those areas of education are being targeted.

Mr McCamphill: On the criteria that are picked, it quite often comes down to asking, "What is the purpose?". If it is to get a system-wide benchmark, it is sometimes a case of using — as blunt as it is — something such as free school meals, because at least you can then see how a cohort, as a whole, is doing. If you are doing that at an individual level, it can be more complicated than that. It depends on what you are using it for.

Ms Hunter: That is really helpful. Thank you so much.

Lastly, off the back of that: there have been a lot of changes in our education system, with discussion around curriculum review and looking at TransformED. Do you think that, at the moment, teachers and unions feel that they are being listened to? Or do you feel that there is an air of hostility? Do teachers feel that they can be honest and contribute their beliefs and opinions? I may be putting you on the spot, but I am curious. Do you feel listened to in your capacity as unions and as teachers?

Ms Whyte: As teachers, no. I have had the pleasure — I choose my words carefully — of going to three TransformED events. All three ended with me out in the hall with teachers who were very distressed. Those were all people who had filled in the consultations, felt very much like you, had put time and thought into it, had got together in groups and whatever, and they felt that their views and thoughts were just not relevant at all. That was how they felt, even at the TransformED events where it is all bells and whistles and lovely glossy brochures. If they asked a question about details of things, it was glossed over or ignored.

One thing in particular, for schools that have specialist units and for general special education children, is that we got, I think, a paragraph in the whole curriculum review. Schools that had taken on SPiMS and other specialist units felt that they were going to be left high and dry, because an average was going to be taken to test how well kids were doing. If you are a school that has taken on many specialist units, obviously, your school average grades, for want of a better word, were going to be a lot lower, and they felt that they were going to be punished and targeted with more meaningless TPL.

The details are not sufficiently specific for people to find themselves in it and to find out how they are going to be successful in it, for the children in their school. Certainly, the feedback that I have been getting is that, even in the most elite and academic of schools, teachers feel that they have not been listened to.

Mr McCamphill: That reflects what we are hearing, too, at school level. However, on engagement with us as unions, I do not know that we can complain. For example, yesterday, we had a very good meeting about assessment. That engagement is taking place. If we were to ask for more meetings, we would get them. However, the challenge is making sure that subject specialists, teachers in SPiMS and teachers in special schools are listened to.

Mr McTaggart: One of the challenges that we have — [Inaudible.]

Mr McTaggart: — is making sure that the people whom we bring to those meetings are the people who need to be there. It is OK for the likes of me, who has been out of the classroom since 2016, to say what, I think, is going on, but we need to be attending meetings with practitioners who are in the classroom so that we can hear exactly what is going on. We get an awful lot of information from our members by going out and meeting them, going to our branch meetings and things like that, but there is nothing better than having the people who need to hear the things hearing it directly from the people who are living it. It is something that we have to be more aware of, as well.

Ms Hunter: That is really helpful. Thank you all so much. It is great to hear about what is working and where you feel listened to but also about the teachers and school leaders who have the expertise and cannot see themselves in the current changes. That is so helpful for us as a Committee to know. Thank you for being here today. We appreciate it.

Mrs Mason: I was waiting until the second round of questioning.

The Chairperson (Mr Mathison): Any sense that we are discussing the Bill is long gone, so crack on. [Laughter.]

Mrs Mason: Joanne, your use of the word "pleasure" was not misconstrued, as "civility" was, so do not worry about that.

I want to ask about the workload review and to get an update on that. I know that it was completed and published towards the end of last year. Can you give us a sense of where we are with it? I believe that there was a trade union rep on the panel for that.

Mr McCamphill: The Minister said in his press release yesterday that he would make an announcement in the next couple of weeks. We are looking forward to that, and our feedback from teachers is that they are very much looking forward to it.

Mrs Mason: Where is it at the minute?

Mr McTaggart: It is with the Minister. It was published on 28 November and has been with the Minister since then. He has taken soundings from his people around the Department. We will need something similar to what was in the heads of agreement document: a timeline to show how things will be implemented. The Minister will probably have to set up an implementation team to put it forward.

We do not want a repeat of what happened two years ago. There were loads of meetings with the unions and the management side, they came up with 247 recommendations, and about three of them have been brought forward. We need a meaningful outcome from the review; the Minister called for it. There are 27 recommendations. Some will cost money, and some can be brought through quickly, but we need to know how they will be implemented and how effective they will be. Once the Minister has announced his understanding of it, we will feed back in.

Mr McCamphill: It will take resource. While there is low-hanging fruit in some recommendations that will only need decisions to be made before they can be implemented, others will take a bit more money and time to put in place.

Mrs Mason: Have you any sense from the Minister of where that is heading, or are you just waiting?

Mr McCamphill: I cannot prejudge him too much, but I would say provisionally that it is positive.

Mr McTaggart: The fact that the Minister called for it means that he has to take responsibility for it from now on. He asked for the independent review; we were happy to accept that. Given that we have it, I know, my colleagues in the Republic of Ireland are asking the Southern Government for something similar on teacher workload. We do not know — the Minister has spoken positively about it to us, but it is what happens next that is important.

Mrs Mason: OK. Is it in the coming weeks that, you think, something will be published?

Mr McCamphill: He said that himself.

Mr McTaggart: Yes. That is what he said in his press release on the pay deal yesterday.

Mrs Mason: Thank you.

Mr Brooks: I just want to explore a bit further the Coventry PGCE model and the iQTS element of it that you talked about. I do not have knowledge of it, so I was looking up bits and pieces. Your way of talking about it made it seem as though Coventry was one model but that there were others.

Mr McCamphill: There are four of them.

Ms Whyte: There are four.

Ms Wright: Apologies.

Mr Brooks: Can you give us some more on that? It sounds like — I used to work for the GMC, and, around Brexit, we often talked about recognition of qualifications and so on, but, sometimes, there was underlying concern about that.

Mr McCamphill: That might be how Northern Ireland could have come to be recognised as a different jurisdiction, but that would need to be explored.

Mr Brooks: OK.

Mr McCamphill: One of the concerns is that it is a generalist-type PGCE course: if you are a maths teacher, although it is all very well having a maths degree, teaching maths to children is a different skill that you need to know, and that needs to be taught. We have concerns about the generalist approach and too much on-the-job training, because some very important pedagogical knowledge is needed.

Mr Brooks: Coming from a place of not having the knowledge, I hear what Joanne said as our saying that, whether they come through that or another journey, we want people of value in different roles in schools. If they want to step into teaching by that route, they should be able to take it — we have talked about it in Committee, and we definitely want that — but, from a Committee point of view, I am curious to learn more about it, including how it aligns with other routes and how it is ensured that standards are kept up.

Mr McCamphill: The big issue is that our system was caught by surprise. The GTC was told that it had no option but to allow it, but there should have been scrutiny. No matter how good it is, there should have been scrutiny.

Ms Whyte: There is also a difference between — we were talking about a PGCE qualification that would allow a subject specialist to teach in a post-primary school, so I do not know how I would feel about that, because we are primary only. The course suits primary only, and I do not know enough, Justin, to comment on post-primary.

Mr Brooks: That feels like something that deserves more scrutiny: courses may not match others when it comes to what people are put through to reach a certain standard. That is not to take away from the qualifications of people who seek those qualifications for cost reasons or other reasons, because we need to make sure that they have those routes, but we also need to understand the different qualifications and make sure that some are not of a lower standard than others. I am not saying that they are, because I do not know enough about it, but we need to scrutinise that. Thanks for making us aware of it.

The Chairperson (Mr Mathison): It may be worthwhile exploring where that qualification sits with members of GTCNI when we have them in to brief us on the Bill. That issue has been raised with me from a number of sources as well.

Mr Brooks: Yes.

Ms Whyte: It would be like going back to the old probationary year that we used to have to do. That would be a good idea.

The Chairperson (Mr Mathison): Yes. That is potentially also something that we can raise with the Department.

I want to ask about one final thing in the Bill that was not picked up in questions, and that is the fee issue. To be clear, Justin, my sense from your evidence was that you do not feel that teachers should pay for the body at all.

Mr McCamphill: They should not, if it is not independent.

The Chairperson (Mr Mathison): You mean that they should not pay for it in its current format. It seems to be built into clause 12, which deals with fees, that the fees that are charged have to cover the costs of running the GTC, but the clause also builds in permission to go beyond that. Does that feel too open-ended from your perspective?

Mr McCamphill: It definitely feels too open-ended. I imagine that the logic is that, if you want to buy a new IT system, that provision will allow you to borrow from the members to do so. Overall, however, so many of the functions that are being taken on are departmental functions that the Department should pay for.

The Chairperson (Mr Mathison): It is good to get that clear and on the record. We can pick up on the issue of fees. I am open-minded about it, but I paused at clause 12 and the sense that the fee has to cover costs. We have no idea of how much it will cost to run the new body, yet, in the current format, teachers will pick up the tab for it. We will need some assurances from the Department around that.

Mr McCamphill: Every hearing will potentially incur the same types of costs as an employment tribunal. It will be big money.

The Chairperson (Mr Mathison): Yes. We may need to build in some safeguards around that. We can pick up on that as we go through the process.

We have probably taken more of your time than you anticipated. We have covered a lot of the broader issues in the questioning, so I propose to bring the evidence session to an end.

The Committee Clerk is suggesting that you may want to speak to the Committee Bill, if any of your members have given you feedback on the issue of the right to wear trousers in schools. Do you want to say anything about that?

Mr McTaggart: Having taught in primary and post-primary schools, I can say that there is no reason why any child should not be allowed to choose whether to wear trousers. It will not have a massive effect on their education. Obviously, things may have to be put in place to ensure that the trousers that children wear are appropriate. Similarly, there are questions at times about whether the trousers of teachers and classroom assistants are appropriate. It comes back to the same thing: children come into school, especially younger children in primary 1, primary 2 and primary 3, and sit cross-legged in open forums. In reality, if they have trousers on, that does not matter, but, if they have short skirts on, it does. It is about that sort of thing. I see no reason why children should not be allowed to make that choice for themselves. In fact, that is in every school's uniform policy. The uniform policy says that children can wear trousers or a skirt. That is normally seen as a matter of gender: boys will wear trousers, and girls will wear skirts. You will not have to change your uniform policy much to say, "You have the choice".

You have the same issue with the cost and types of skirts. My daughters went to an all-girls' school, and their skirt changed three times as they went up through the school. We had kids from Stepping Stones, you know, and, after the third year, they all had to change everything. There is a cost with that. If you can have a pair of trousers that is the same for boys and girls, that makes life easier for families, because they no longer worry about having a different uniform for each child.

The Chairperson (Mr Mathison): Grand.

Mr Brooks: May I ask something quickly on the Bill?

The Chairperson (Mr Mathison): I think that the witnesses may need to move on.

Mr Brooks: Fair enough. That is no bother.

The Chairperson (Mr Mathison): I will close things at this stage. We may be in touch with you. TransformED came up a number of times during the evidence session. Some input on that from you, the teaching profession, may be helpful. We will discuss that after the briefing. Thank you all for your time. I appreciate your patience with the briefing.