Salford City College employees have continued striking in protest of wages outside the Future Skills building on Langworthy Road.

After the government set a national agreed wage in the UK, the CEO of Salford City College decided to not allow it. This resulted in the employees protesting, in order to get their voices heard and their rights addressed.

The National Education Union (NEU), is the largest education union in the UK with 451,000 members.

Formed in 2017, the union is responsible for making sure that teachers are supported economically and emotionally.

As there are more and more students enrolling to the colleges, there is a major lack of teachers due to £700 million in cut in wages and facilities.

Nick Zabel, a media teacher at Salford City College talked about the strikes he is currently involved in: “It’s a strike by the NEU and it’s against changes to our terms and conditions at the college, so there’s been a national agreed wage set by government and to those terms and conditions for sixth form teachers.

“Our current CEO refuses to agree with the national wage for sixth form teachers.”

Photograph taken by Zak Rafael

The protesters wrapped up warm in the almost freezing weather in order to display their negative emotions about their situation.

There were many posters, megaphones and drums to make for a more vibrant atmosphere.

Photograph by Zak Rafael

Zabel continued: “We did six days initially and we’re now into the last four days so this is the second day into our 4 days already.

“There’s just been an Ofsted inspection so we’re protesting through that as well.

“I’m a media teacher, I teach creative media and journalism, but were all made up of different factions and different elements.

“There’s everything from English and Maths teachers to ESOL teachers.

“There’s people from performing arts, so a multitude of different departments coming together.”

Salford City College is made up of a number of different centres, including Future Skills (Langworthy), Pendleton Sixth Form College, Eccles Sixth Form and Worsley College.

Photograph by Nick Brien

Here are the statistics:

Created by Nick Brien

This is not the first time that there has been strikes from the staff at Salford City College.

Towards the end of November the NEU and Salford City College both striked for the first time, so they didn’t know what to expect.

This time round they seem to be more equipped.

Here is a map infographic to show the different Salford City Colleges that are striking together for better funding:

Created by Nick Brien</h6

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