Now teachers demand to work just 35 hours a week... and they even want to be allowed to do five of those at home

Teachers demanded a 20-hour a week limit on classes yesterday to maintain a healthy ‘work/life balance’.
Union members called for a rigid 35-hour week, with little more than half given over to teaching children.
Five hours would be used for planning, preparation and assessment ‘at a time and place of the teacher’s choosing’ – meaning at home in most cases.

Taking to the streets: A National Union of Teachers protest in Newcastle

The remaining ten hours would be set aside for other ‘non-contact’ duties including marking and going to meetings.
The proposal came at the end of a heated eight-day period during which annual conferences held by three teaching unions were used to repeatedly attack the policies of Education Secretary Michael Gove.

The working hours motion of the National Union of Teachers – which was passed by an overwhelming majority and will be linked to planned strikes over pay, pensions and conditions – would mean teachers taking classes for just four hours a day on average. Many schools would have to hire extra staff, putting greater pressure on budgets.
Cutting teaching workloads is one of the demands in the current dispute with Mr Gove that has led to a series of regional strikes from this summer, followed by a national strike before Christmas.

The teachers complain that they spend too much time outside lessons marking and preparing for parents evenings, leaving them without time to have meetings or plan lessons

Critics were swift to accuse the union of being ‘out of touch’ with reality. Craig Whittaker, a Tory MP on the Commons education select committee, said: ‘You can’t change these things in the current economic climate.
‘It just shows how incredibly out of touch the unions are with what’s going on in the real world.’
Chris McGovern, of the Campaign for Real Education, said teachers should have their hours ‘expanded, not diminished’. He added: ‘In the independent sector it is normal to have 60 hours of contact time a week. They are living in fantasy land if they want 20 hours per week.’
He said the hours of work should be made less stressful by giving them greater powers to suspend or exclude disruptive pupils. The NUT saved its bombshell for the last motion of its five-day conference in Liverpool. Cambridgeshire primary school teacher Richard Rose said: ‘We’re fed up with arriving at 7.45am ... and most people are there until 6.30pm.
‘During that time there is no time to go to eat, no time to talk, no time to think, no time even to go to the toilet in many cases.

‘Then, after the day’s work, what do you do when you get home? Do you relax? I’m sure you all know – another two, three, four hours of work. The number of emails you get after midnight, people sending each other plans, targets, data, things like that is incredible.’
Teachers were sacrificing time with their own children, he said, adding: ‘If you complain to management about that they say “Maybe teaching’s not for you then”.’
Adarsh Sood from Lewisham in South-East London said: ‘We will fight in all the ways we can to win a model contract which clearly defines the weekly limits on working hours for teachers.’
Earlier in the day, delegates chanted: ‘Gove must go’ as they passed a motion of no confidence in the Education Secretary.
Teachers are contracted to work 195 days every year, with five set aside for training.
They typically spend 22.5 hours taking classes each week, meaning the proposal would significantly reduce contact time.
But they complain contracts include a clause to carry out ‘reasonable additional hours’, meaning they end up working longer.
Coventry delegate Christopher Denson said official figures showed secondary school teachers work 50.2 hours per week on average and primary school colleagues give 49.9 hours of their time.
He added: ‘It is essential that what is already NUT policy for a 35-hour week becomes a reality.’
The NUT and NASUWT are holding a series of regional strikes followed by a national strike later this year over pay, pensions and conditions. Some teachers are already operating on a work-to-rule basis.
The working hours motion – during which teachers also called for smaller class sizes – is the latest point of friction between teachers and Mr Gove.
They have also clashed with him over issues such as changes to the curriculum and the end of modular qualifications. The Department for Education said it was for schools to organise the hours and workloads of staff.
A spokesman added: ‘By scrapping unnecessary paperwork and bureaucracy we are making it easier than ever before for teachers to focus their efforts on teaching and learning.’

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