Some 15,000 primary school teachers from Utrecht, Noord-Holland and Flevoland joined a protest march in Amsterdam on Wednesday as teachers went on strike throughout the three provinces.

The strike is part of a campaign for higher wages and improvements in working conditions which began last year.

The demonstrators say the shortage of primary school teachers, currently around 2,000, will double by 2020 and that the government is not doing enough to boost teaching as a profession.

Last month, education minister Arie Slob sealed a deal on reducing the pressure of work at primary schools, including a €237m pay-out to employ more teachers.

Although this comes on top of the €270m already agreed, teachers, unions and school managers say it is not enough. They want the government to come up with an extra €630m to boost pay.

Wednesday’s action is the fourth in a series of rolling strikes which have been planned in support of the campaign. The next strike, on April 13, will take place in Groningen, Friesland and Drenthe.