Speaking at the ATL president's reception, Andy Ballard said he was ashamed that children and young people were experiencing levels of poverty today that are the same as 30-years-ago.
He also said rural communities suffered more from lack of aspiration and opportunity, including a shortage of affordable housing and well-paid work forcing families to move away from rural areas, leading to the closure of local services.
"It is unacceptable to me that children from poor families are treated as if they were feckless and idle, as if their poverty was their fault," he said. "These children must become our collective responsibility."
Ballard also called for the government to reassess SATs in the light of this year's delayed results and "continuing debacle" and criticised the pursuit of the academies programme.
"The government is making and compounding a mistake in creating a more diverse school estate which will merely benefit the middle class and increase social division," he said.
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