Teachers hold largest education strike in New Zealand

Tens of thousands of New Zealand teachers walked off the job on Wednesday, May 29, in protest as they called for higher pay and shorter hours in the country's largest ever education strike.

According to Press TV, almost 50,000 secondary and primary school teachers joined the strike, according to their unions, closing schools around the nation.

The strike came a day before Jacinda Ardern's government was set to release its first "Wellbeing" budget, which had been touted globally as a new approach to fiscal decision-making guided by a broader range of indicators to improve New Zealanders' living standards.

Unions working on behalf of teachers have been negotiating with the government for months for pay rises and measures to reduce workloads, but so far have ended in deadlock.

The strike spotlights the difficulties Arden's government faces in delivering on its promise to pour money into social services and rein in economic inequality when it took office in 2017.

ME