COUNCIL chiefs say they have no choice but to pursue controversial changes to teaching assistant contracts after they were accused of a divide and rule approach.

A letter sent by Durham County Council to headteachers said teaching assistants who were members of the GMB would get a two-year compensatory payment for agreeing to change to term-time only pay.

However, Unison members will face dismissal, then re-engagement on the new conditions from January with only a single year's compensation.

Unlike the GMB, Unison members voted to reject what the council said was a “last” revised compensation offer in the dispute and are now being balloted on strike action.

Teaching assistants who remain in dispute with the authority said the council’s approach could mean colleagues in the same classroom being on different rates of pay.

Megan Charlton, a teaching assistant and Unison member, told the BBC: "How dare they try and put us against each other and split us up and divide us.

“We won't be victims, we will fight this all the way."

Meanwhile, Durham teaching assistant Angela Braban said on Twitter that she had received a dismissal letter, but would not be signing it and would be striking instead.

Durham County Council plans to change the contracts of its 2,600 teaching assistants so they will be paid only for the hours they work, which unions say in extreme cases will mean a pay cut of up to 23 per cent for some staff.

Caroline O’Neill, head of education at Durham County Council, said: “Neither the teaching assistants, the trade unions or the council want to be in this position, but we have no choice.

“This is what all but one other councils in the North East, and many nationally, have already done.

“We have tried really hard to mitigate the impact of changes linked to paying staff for the hours they actually work.”

The council said there were still several hundred staff, most of whom are not in a union, who were now being given the chance to accept or decline the two-year compensation offer.

About 150 teaching assistants, who are already employed on a term time only basis, will see no change to their contracts.