CATHOLIC school teachers will walk off the job today (May 27) in Canberra and across NSW calling for a pay increase of up to 15 per cent.
Thousands of teachers at more than 500 Catholic schools in the ACT and NSW will take part in the 24-hour strike over pay and conditions.
Within the Canberra Goulburn Archdiocese, two ACT schools and four NSW schools will close completely.
Minimal supervision will be offered at 11 NSW schools and 11 ACT schools.
The union wants a pay increase of 10 to 15 per cent over two years, less paperwork, more time for planning and an end to staff shortages.
It’s the first full-day stoppage by Catholic school teachers in 18 years.
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![Teacher Vanessa Jones has been living in Higgins since 2001, and while she loves the area, she says she is “fed up” with the neglectful ACT government.
The Higgins shops have been completely abandoned, says Vanessa, preventing the opportunity for residents to have a community-centred space to socialise.
They only received bins nine months ago, she says, and requests for a water station and repairs to the bus station have gone unanswered.
“It’s very, very slow,” says Vanessa.
“I asked for the zebra crossing on Fullagar [Crescent] to be repainted, and we had to wait about six or nine months.
“That’s just such a long time… we pay a lot of rates.”
Vanessa says assistance from the government only seems to go to communities with time-rich and assertive communities, leaving places such as Higgins, where the majority of households have both adults working full-time and English may not be the first language of the family, at an automatic disadvantage.
“If you’ve got two people working, paying a mortgage, raising two or three kids, they don’t have the time,” says Vanessa.
Vanessa says the lack of attention quieter places such as Higgins is receiving is starting to look a lot like favouritism.
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