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The NASUWT teaching union will hold its first contested leadership election for a generation after a challenger to Matt Wrack, the former firefighters’ union general secretary, emerged after Wrack had been appointed to the role unopposed.
Neil Butler, an NASUWT official who won a legal battle against the union’s national executive to run, has passed the threshold required to be a candidate, triggering a members’ vote against Wrack later this year.
Wayne Broom, the NASUWT’s president, said: “Following the close of nominations, there is now a contested election and we will move to a ballot of members.” Broom said the election would begin on 19 June and close on 23 July.
The result sets up an ideologically charged contest between Wrack, seen as being on the left of the Labour party, and the traditionally more moderate union mainstream.
Wrack was named as the national executive’s preferred candidate for general secretary in March. Under the NASUWT’s rules, Wrack would have automatically filled the position if no other candidate received enough nominations from local branches.
Butler’s initial attempt to gather nominations was ruled out by the national executive on the grounds that, as an employee, he was not a member of the union.
But Butler started legal proceedings to challenge the executive’s decision, with the NASUWT backing down shortly before a hearing at the high court that cost the union at least £70,000 in legal fees. Wrack was then named acting general secretary and nominations were reopened.
Now Butler’s supporters say he has gained well above the 25 branch nominations required to be a candidate, setting off the union’s first ballot for general secretary since 1990.
The general secretary selection process has been fraught with difficulty after Patrick Roach’s decision last year to step down after only one term in office.
Wrack impressed members of the national executive appointments committee when he was interviewed alongside Butler and other candidates, and the executive then announced Wrack as its preferred candidate.
But the appointment proved controversial among many NASUWT members, in part because Wrack had been general secretary of the Fire Brigades Union (FBU) for 20 years until losing his re-election bid in January.
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Members who spoke to the Guardian said they were concerned about the fact Wrack had never been a teacher but would be leading a major union that restricts its membership to qualified teachers and lecturers, as well as his outspoken views on politics and the Israel-Gaza conflict.
Speaking to the Guardian earlier this month, Wrack blamed a “ludicrous” and “coordinated” attempt by political enemies to undermine his position, and vowed to stand in the event of an election.
Wrack, who went to a Catholic grammar school in Manchester and studied with the Open University before completing a part-time master’s degree at the London School of Economics, said his lack of teaching experience was irrelevant.
“It strikes me that people seem to be able to be the secretary of state for education without any teaching experience,” Wrack said.
Butler, the NASUWT’s national officer for Wales, is a former teacher.
