Correna Haythorpe, the president of the Australian Education Union held a press conference a little earlier calling on governments to listen to teachers and give them a bigger say in how money is spent in the education system:

Australia has an incredibly dedicated teaching profession but they’re absolutely buckling under the strain after a decade of a lack of resources. Our latest State of our Schools survey, which has been taken across 12,000 members, tells a very sorry tale; 95% of principles report that student complexity has increased. We’ve got students with very diverse needs, mental health and wellbeing issues, and that’s having an impact on teaching and learning programs in schools.

Over 55% of teachers report burnout from unsustainable workloads and the complexity that they’re facing every single day. The Albanese government has announced an unprecedented investment not of over $20bn across the next decade and we’re here to say that teachers have to be at the heart of any decisions that governments make about where that money is spent in schools. Our members know what counts on the ground. They are calling for full-service schools with wraparound supports in terms of mental health and occupational health, any medical health that students might need in schools, to help those kids who have more complex needs. They’re calling for more time teaching, more administrative support staff, smaller class sizes and they’re calling for their unsustainable workloads to be addressed.