NSW Teacher's Federation day of action: Dubbo teachers protest salary caps amidst teacher shortage

NSW Teachers' Federation Dubbo organiser, Tim Danaher, said the decision by the Perrottet Government to cap pay increases for teachers to 2.53 percent per year for three years - while inflation is 6.1 percent - would make it even harder for struggling local schools to recruit staff.

"There's a lot of frustration and anger at the moment and we are losing teachers in ridiculous numbers. We're already struggling to attract teachers due to the workload and teachers' pay sitting stagnant for so long," he said.

"Why would people come into a profession where they know they'll be working 60 plus hours a week and your salary will top out after nine years?"

Teachers in Dubbo planned to rally outside Dugald Saunders' office on Wednesday morning as part of a statewide day of action but the rally was postponed over wet weather concerns.

Instead, Dubbo teachers wore red clothes today in solidarity with their colleagues rallying in regional towns including Bathurst, Port Macquarie and Tamworth and in Sydney at the Industrial Relations Commission office in Parramatta.

"Teachers aren't shy about doing hard work - but it needs to be recognised. We do those extra hours because we want to be there for the kids," Mr Danaher said.

"But if no action is taken to improve workloads and pay teachers are going to continue to burn out, which means our kids are missing out. There's a whole generation of kids that will miss out."

Across the state, many permanent and casual teaching positions remain unfilled. In June there were 12 vacant positions at the Dubbo College Delroy Campus alone, the second highest number of vacancies in the state.

A Department of Education ministerial briefing, obtained by the Teachers' Federation under FOI, revealed there were more than 2,000 permanent teaching positions vacant in public schools at the end of July.

62 percent of public schools (1,367) had at least one permanent teaching position vacant 17.5 percent (390) had two or more and 2.3 percent (50) had five or more.

NSW Teachers Federation president, Angelo Gavrielatos, said the cap on wages would "increase the shortages" and make it harder to "secure the teachers we need for our future."

"At a time when there are growing teacher shortages, we need real action on uncompetitive salaries and unsustainable workloads," he said.

The day of action came after teachers decided against a strike planned for Wednesday over concerns it would put undue stress on students starting their HSC exams - a move Education Minister Sarah Mitchell supported.

"I'm pleased the union has heeded our calls to cancel strike action that would have caused additional stress for HSC students across NSW. Strikes on school days are always unnecessarily disruptive and cause stress for students and parents, even more so during the HSC exams," she said.

Last week Minister Mitchell announced the government would be allowing secondary school teachers an extra 30 minutes a week of time outside the classroom for lesson preparation - taking the total amount of time to six hours.

"For high school teachers, this additional time will mean that they will now have the equivalent of almost one full day every week for lesson planning," said NSW Premier Dominic Perrottet.

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