Pat Hawkes (The Argus, November 25) is completely out of touch.

Teachers and many parents in Brighton have given teaching assistants tremendous support because they know what a fantastic job they do.

As a member of the TUC General Council and NUT, Councillor Hawkes should be ashamed of herself for promoting class division in the classroom.

Teachers are entitled to be paid during the school holidays, so why deny that to teaching assistants?

She must know her deft use of figures is misleading. No teaching assistant, even if they work full-time, will get anything like the kind of money she claims.

Our members do not take strike action lightly - they don't want to harm the education of children or disrupt the lives of parents, but the council is treating them badly and they are angry.

The council may have increased pay rates but, at the same time, it has cut the number of weeks which teaching assistants will be paid from 49 to 44. Teachers get paid for 52 weeks of the year, so it is only fair that teaching assistants should be treated in the same way.

-Dave Prentis, general secretary, Unison, Mabledon Place, London