A survey of more than 9,000 NEU support staff across schools in England and Wales reveals an education system increasingly reliant on the unpaid labour of overstretched staff. Schools and colleges are being kept afloat only because support staff are being pushed beyond their limits.
Job creep—where staff are expected to take on tasks or responsibilities beyond their job descriptions—is widespread. In many cases, these duties exceed their pay grade; in others, they create unsustainable workloads that require staff to work beyond their contracted hours
What is ‘job creep’?
‘Job creep’ occurs when support staff are directed – explicitly or indirectly – to work beyond their contracted hours or to take on duties outside their job description. This can happen through direct management instruction or through workloads that are simply unmanageable within contracted hours.
Findings from the 2025 NEU annual support staff survey show:
- 74 per cent of members regularly work beyond their contracted hours.
- Over half report that their job description no longer reflects the work they do.
Why is the NEU concerned about this?
No worker should be asked to work without pay. Support staff are some of the lowest-paid workers in education, who often feel powerless to challenge the abuse of their goodwill and professionalism. It is therefore essential that NEU reps support members to challenge job creep.
Working beyond contracted hours
Support staff must not be directed to work additional hours without agreement and proper compensation. Where additional hours are genuinely required, this must be agreed with the staff member and must be remunerated with overtime pay or time off in lieu (TOIL). If support staff are working beyond their hours because of excessive
workload, duties must be reduced so the role fits within their contracted hours.
Working beyond job descriptions
Support staff should not be instructed to undertake duties outside their job description. If an employer wishes to change a job description, this must be:
- Discussed and agreed with the staff member, and
- Re-evaluated through the employer’s job evaluation scheme to ensure appropriate pay.
Do support staff have a contractual right to a job evaluation?
Yes. Most support staff have the Green Book incorporated into their contract.
The Green Book states that any additional responsibilities must be assessed through the employer’s grading system. This means job evaluation is a contractual right.
Can job evaluation or overtime pay be refused due to a lack of funding?
No. Although chronic underfunding from successive governments has created a crisis across schools and colleges, financial pressure does not justify refusing overtime pay or blocking job evaluation.
What can NEU reps do?
NEU reps play a crucial role in tackling job creep. You should:
- Bring support staff together to review whether their job descriptions and contracted hours reflect the work they do.
- Encourage members to request meetings with their line managers to raise these concerns and ask that you attend as their rep.
- Following a meeting, the meeting should result in one of the following:
- Removal of inappropriate duties,
- Overtime pay or TOIL for excess hours, or
- A formal review and re-evaluation of the job description using the school’s job evaluation scheme.
Resources
Reps and members can use the following resources to tackle support staff job creep in their workplace or across their MATs.
- Download the bargaining essentials: tackling support staff's ‘job creep’ : This resource, as detailed above, addresses the issues relating to job creep and guidance for Reps on steps they and members can take to address it.
- Support staff survey on job creep: Reps can use this survey to gauge the extent of job creep among support staff at their workplace as a first step towards tackling it.
- Overworked and underpaid leaflet : Reps and members can use the leaflet to raise awareness of the issue amongst NEU members and un-unionised colleagues. It is a useful resource to use to build for a NEU members’ meeting on the issue.
- Reps can use this PowerPoint at their members’ meetings to raise awareness of job creep in the workplace and explain how union groups can tackle it.
Further support
If your employer is unwilling to engage with the process of re-evaluation, contact your local Districts and branches for advice on escalation.