Created on: 04 Mar 2026
A statutory industrial action ballot of teachers across Scotland has delivered an overwhelming mandate for industrial action over teacher workload.
The ballot, organised by the EIS closed earlier today.
93% of EIS members voting backed Industrial Action Short of Strike (ASOS) over teacher workload, with 85% backing Strike Action. Turnout in the postal ballot was 60%.
Commenting on the ballot result this afternoon, EIS General Secretary Andrea Bradley said, “This is an overwhelming ballot result, which delivers a very clear mandate for industrial action by teachers over excessive workload.
"For five long years, teachers have been waiting for manifesto promises, made by the current Scottish Government prior to the last Holyrood election, on tackling teacher workload to come to fruition.
"With no real sign of delivery of those promises on reducing excessive teacher workload by recruiting 3,500 additional teachers while tackling teacher unemployment and zero-hours contracts, and reducing teachers’ maximum class contact time to 21 hours per week, teachers’ patience is clearly now at an end.”
Ms Bradley continued, "We are long past the time when these promises made to Scotland’s teachers should have been kept, honoured and delivered by the Scottish Government and local authority employers.
"They have previously jointly pledged to deliver these important commitments, but have since done little to ensure long-awaited improvements to the working conditions of teachers and the associated learning conditions of pupils.
"The EIS continues to offer the requisite solutions to the current workload dispute for agreement, without the need for industrial action. We hope that this ballot result will finally propel the Scottish Government and COSLA into action and serious negotiation to bring the dispute to an end after more than a year."
Ms Bradley added, "The EIS Executive Committee will meet on Thursday afternoon to consider the ballot result, and to agree the next steps to be taken in the dispute over teacher workload. Further details will be published following tomorrow’s meeting."