Victorian teachers will strike for a third time on August 19, and there is currently no education minister to negotiate with

Victorian state school teachers will stop work for 24 hours on August 19, the third strike this year, after pay negotiations with the government stalled completely.

The Australian Education Union’s joint primary and secondary council voted for the action on Friday. It will proceed unless a deal is reached first.

“They want to see the government put a revised offer, and they want to be able to genuinely consider any revised offer,” Victorian branch president Justin Mullaly said.

“In the absence of that, then we will escalate our campaign.”

Nothing has moved since the last offer was tabled on July 17. Mullaly says no further talks have been scheduled and he has not been asked to any.

“I would need an invitation to attend a meeting,” he said.

Part of the problem is that nobody is currently in the chair.

Ben Carroll was the education minister running these negotiations until Tuesday, when he was sworn in as premier following Jacinta Allan’s resignation. His new cabinet will not be announced until next week, which leaves the union without a counterpart four months out from the November election.

Carroll said on Thursday his door was open and that the government was close to a deal after pulling every lever.

Members rejected the most recent offer on July 17, with 51.8 per cent voting against. Six days later, 20,000 educators marched through Melbourne’s CBD.

That offer would have lifted pay for teachers and education support staff by at least 28.3 per cent over four years, including 12.75 per cent by October. The union is seeking 35 per cent over four years, after knocking back an opening offer of 18.5 per cent over three.

A government spokesperson said reaching agreement was in everyone’s interest and that the rejected offer would have made Victorian teachers the best paid in the country.

They are currently the worst. A Victorian graduate teacher earns $13,000 less than one in the Northern Territory.

Mullaly said the retention numbers are the argument.

“Only three-in-10 teachers are saying they’ll stick around until retirement,” he said.

The union also wants the state to commit to long-term commonwealth funding under the Schooling Resource Standard before it signs anything.

In March, 35,000 teachers gathered on the steps of state parliament in the first Victorian stop-work action in 13 years. There have been two more since.