Structural implications of the School Support Staff Negotiating Body

At the moment, the majority of school support staff are covered by the same negotiating body as council workers (the National Joint Council or NJC). 

UNISON has been working with the government to create a new negotiating body: The School Support Staff Negotiating Body (SSSNB). The SSSNB will give support staff a voice and will be a vehicle to increase fairness in pay and conditions for support staff across the board.

The SSSNB will decide pay, terms and conditions for school support staff working in all types of state-funded schools, including academies and schools within multi academy trusts. This means that all school support staff will benefit from the same pay and conditions; academies will no longer be able to opt-out of paying nationally negotiated rates of pay. 

The SSSNB will also be a negotiating body that only talks about school support staff, which means that we can focus on issues that really affect staff working in schools. 

This report has been produced to explore the potential implications of the SSSNB for UNISON’s own structures. 

It is hoped that this report will be debated at UNISON’s Local Government Conference in June, 2026.