AS WE gather for TUC Congress 2025, we do so with a clear message: austerity has failed. It has failed our schools, our hospitals, our communities — and most of all, it has failed our children.

For 14 years the Tory-led government pursued a deliberate programme of cuts and privatisation. They hollowed out the welfare state, slashed front-line services, and left public-sector workers to pick up the pieces. The result? A national crisis in education, healthcare and local government. At the same time, millions of families continue to suffer from the unresolved cost-of-living crisis. This is feeding growing disillusionment in the political process.

The NASUWT has consistently warned of the consequences. Without full funding, schools cannot recruit or retain staff. Children suffer. The recruitment and retention crisis deepens.

And sadly we were right.

Today, schools are being asked to do more with less. Ministers have announced a 4 per cent pay award for teachers and that is welcome — but a quarter of that rise is expected to come from overstretched school budgets. That’s not a genuine pay rise — it’s a political trick. It forces headteachers to choose between staff and pupils. Either way, children lose.

Let the message be loud and clear: you cannot run a world-class education system on real-terms pay cuts and slashed funding. And you cannot expect teachers to carry the burden of a broken system indefinitely.

Morale is at rock bottom in many schools. Recruitment targets are missed year after year.

Experienced teachers are leaving the profession in droves. And when they go, it’s children and communities who pay the price.

But this crisis isn’t confined to education. Across the public sector, the story is the same. Hospitals are overwhelmed. Local councils are on the brink. Firefighters, refuse workers, civil servants — all are being asked to do the impossible with dwindling resources.

Too many public buildings — including schools and hospitals — are in a dire state of repair.

Capital budgets have been slashed to the bone. Staff are working in unsafe conditions.

Children are learning in buildings that should have been condemned years ago.

This is not just a funding crisis. It is the direct result of austerity — a political legacy that must be dismantled. The trade unions must step up to the task.

The NASUWT is proud to lead the debate on taxing wealth, funding public services and shifting power in favour of working people at Congress.

It’s a bold and necessary call for change. It demands full funding for public services. It demands an end to profiteering by chief executives and corporations. It demands a crackdown on tax avoidance and the implementation of progressive wealth taxes. And it demands investment in safe, well-maintained public buildings.

Because while schools struggle, some academy bosses are raking in half a million pounds in bloated salaries. Supply agencies pocket hundreds of millions in public money. Private providers charge eye-watering fees for services that should be publicly delivered.

This is profiteering with our children’s futures. It’s a scandal. And it must end. There are also similar stories of profiteering elsewhere in public services.

But we must also recognise the wider political context and what we are seeing in some parts of the country.

Hostile protests outside hotels housing asylum-seekers. The rise of Reform. The involvement of fascist groups in street mobilisations. These are not isolated incidents — they are symptoms of a deeper political failure.

People voted for and expected change in 2024. But so far they are not seeing it delivered. Instead, frustration and anger are growing among many voters. And when Labour echoes Nigel Farage on migration, it does not neutralise the threat — it legitimises it. Every concession only emboldens the far right to go further.

The politics of scapegoating and division must be rejected outright. What we are seeing represents a clear challenge to trade unions and to the labour movement. We have a responsibility to demand change and to see that change delivered.

We must lead with clarity and provide solutions and hope. We must defend the rights of migrants, stand against racism and xenophobia, and continue to build solidarity among workers and in communities.

Because where Reform cannot and will not deliver is on raising living standards and improving and valuing our public services. Polling shows that even among those flirting with Reform, the demand is clear: Fix the NHS. Fund our schools. Rescue our councils. That is the terrain on which the labour movement must fight — and win.

We need urgent support for collapsing local authorities — to protect libraries, youth services and social care. We must see a fully funded NHS, free at the point of use, with safe staffing levels and fair pay for all health workers. And we demand urgent investment in schools, with guaranteed funding for teacher pay awards and repairs to crumbling buildings.

We urge the government to listen — to the teachers, the nurses, the firefighters, the parents.

To the millions who voted for hope. They did not vote for more of the same.

We welcome the opportunity to work with ministers who are serious about rebuilding public services. But warm words are not enough. We need action. We need investment. We need a Budget that delivers for the people we represent, their families and their communities next month.

The NASUWT stands in solidarity with all public-sector workers. We are all facing the same struggle — and together, we are the answer.

We don’t apologise for demanding decent wages and good pensions. We don’t apologise for wanting fair funding in our schools. We don’t apologise for fighting for the future of our children.

We’ve demanded. We’ve organised. We’ve fought — and we’ve won. From the picket line to the front line, from pit villages to primary schools, our strength has always been in each other — in solidarity.

So to every teacher, every parent, every worker reading this: Stand with us. Speak with us. March with us. Because a better future is possible — but only if we organise and fight for it.

Matt Wrack is general secretary of NASUWT – The Teachers’ Union.