Created on: 18 Mar 2026
Members of the EIS-FELA who teach welding and fabrication at the City of Glasgow College’s Riverside campus will take strike action from 20th March over health and safety concerns including exposure to carcinogenic fumes from welding.
The local EIS-FELA branch lodged a dispute with the City of Glasgow College on 24th November 2025 due to fears that lecturers and students were being exposed to carcinogenic fumes during welding without an adequate risk assessment or protective equipment.
A College funded independent report found that whilst ventilation systems, when used correctly, did keep levels of exposure within current legal limits, not all hazardous particles were captured meaning staff and students (including under 18 year olds) inhale nickel, chromium, manganese, iron and other dust particles.
EIS-FELA have been left with no other option but to take strike action primarily due to the College’s refusal to provide air fed respiratory masks to reduce the risk of fume exposure to as low a level as possible, failure to update the remaining workshop risk assessments (particularly around levels of dust in the workshops) and to provide the necessary training updates to lecturing staff.
A spokesperson for the EIS-FELA branch commented, "Due to the intransigence of CoGC management, reaching an agreed settlement to the health and safety dispute has been significantly hampered, and our welding lecturers are therefore left with no other option than to take strike action.
"Our branch stands in full solidarity with the affected members in their struggle for better and safer working and learning conditions. All management has to do to settle the dispute and avoid strike action is to put basic health and safety measures in place."
The EIS wishes to see a college-wide review of Health and Safety arrangements to reassure lecturing staff and students that Health and Safety standards are as safe as possible.
City of Glasgow College has been notified of industrial action for affected members on the following dates:
More dates may follow if the dispute is not resolved.