The manoeuvre brings more resources for renewals and 2,000 support professions

The balance of posts for teachers coming out of the 2025 manoeuvre is set to be negative by more than 3,500. Against a reduction of 5,660 posts on the staff of autonomy from the next school year, which was provided for in the initial text of the bill and remained so even after the first parliamentary passage in the House, an increase of 1,866 support teachers already in 2025/26 has popped up during the procedure in Montecitorio. This will be followed by a further 134 in 2026/27, bringing the total number of new entrants dedicated to supporting pupils with disabilities to 2,000. As a result of a budget law that, for the rest, spares no effort on the upcoming contract renewals for school personnel, that postpones by 12 months the farewell of 2,174 technical-administrative assistants (Ata) and that increases by 60 million euro, from 2025, the funds for the Teachers' Charter so as to extend it to substitute teachers until 31 August. However, it will be possible to reduce the amount (from the fixed 500 euro to 'up to 500 euro') on the basis of a Mim-Mef decree.

In reviewing the innovations that the 2025 manoeuvre brings as a dowry for school personnel, we start from the increase of 2 thousand support teachers over two school years that, as we reported in Il Sole 24 Ore on 18 December, characterised the last ten days of the measure. The draft of a first government amendment, which was never deposited, set the bar at 5,000 teachers. Then came another one signed by the rapporteurs that stopped at 1,610 additional units. Until the final compromise (1,866 professors in 2025/26 and 134 in 2026/27), which will entail an expenditure of 24.99 million for 2025 and 87.5 for 2026. Most of which (22.9 million in the first year and 75 in the second) will come from the Fund for the Enhancement of the School System introduced by the same manoeuvre; the remainder (12.5 million for 2026, 14.17 for 2027 and so on) will be taken from the Fund for Structural Economic Policy Interventions provided for by Decree 284 of 2004.

Worthy of note, still on the subject of personnel, is also the recruitment of 101 officials for the Territorial School Offices (Usr) to manage their reorganisation and provide extra help in resolving the long-standing issue of school trips, on which a new exemption to the Procurement Code arrived in recent days from Anac.

The highlight of the Budget Law is contractual increases and tax measures. Let's start with the 2022-24 collective bargaining agreement, on which, for the school sector, there are already three billion euro that, according to the first calculations of Aran, will allow a 5.78% increase in payroll, equal to almost 140 euro gross per month for 13 months (136.85 euro, actually). It will benefit 1.2 million employees in the sector, including 850,000 teachers. The topping-up of resources provided for in the manoeuvre will lead to an average salary increase of 6 per cent. Resources are then allocated for the next contractual round 2025-27. At the level of the entire public administration it is 1.75 billion for 2025, 3.55 for 2026 and 5.55 billion annually from 2027, which will guarantee average salary increases of 5.4 per cent. Translated into figures, this means EUR 135.25 in average monthly pay as of 1 January 2027 (with the possibility of the first advances already in 2025).

Lastly, from January, the effects of the mix between the remodulation of the Irpef rate (from four to three) and the stabilisation of the tax wedge cut (extended up to 40 thousand euro of income) will be felt. The effect on the pay packet will be about one thousand euro a year up to about 35 thousand euro of income. Beyond that it will be 900 euro with a décalage up to around 40 thousand euro of income: a figure where the effects of the intervention will be zero.