Workload/Class Contact Time

On workload, the frustration and anger of NASUWT members was palpable in our survey in June/July on the failure of the Scottish Government and COSLA to progress the promised reduction in class contact time from 22.5 hours per week to 21 hours. A clear majority of our members were in favour of taking some form of industrial action, should there be no significant progress on delivering this promise.

Despite an agreement earlier this year to set up a series of meetings of a Scottish Negotiating Committee for Teachers (SNCT) Sub-group on Reduced Class Contact Time, with NASUWT representation, there remains no significant progress on this matter. As a result, NASUWT has now lodged a formal trade dispute with the Scottish Government and local authority employers and advised that ‘in the event that immediate steps are not taken to ensure this manifesto pledge is fulfilled… NASUWT will have no alternative other than to ballot our members for industrial action.’

Members will be kept abreast of any response from Scottish Government and COSLA, but preparations for a statutory ballot for industrial action will continue in earnest in the meantime.

Pay

On pay, despite a shift in the ‘pay year’ for teachers, which now begins on 1 August, once again there has been a failure to agree a pay settlement that can be implemented in time. Having rejected a 3% offer in March of this year, a revised and improved offer for teachers was eventually received (amounting to 4% for the 2025/26 pay year and 3.5% for the following year).

However, following a meeting of teacher unions on 27 August, NASUWT and others have decided to reject this offer, largely because of rising inflation (with the RPI measure still at 4.5%) and there being no reopener clause as part of the latest offer. A revised offer is still awaited.

Your feedback

If you require a response from us, please DO NOT use this form. Please use our Contact Us page instead.

In our continued efforts to improve the website, we evaluate all the feedback you leave here because your insight is invaluable to us, but all your comments are processed anonymously and we are unable to respond to them directly.