Created on: 05 Jun 2026
The General Secretary of the EIS has used her address to the AGM to warn the “wolves are in the door” with the rise of the far right in both UK and Scottish politics.
Andrea Bradley told the EIS AGM at Dundee Caird hall that the failures of governments to properly meet the needs of many sections of society have directly contributed to the rise of extremist, far-right narratives.
“We, every single one of us here, at this, the EIS’s 180th AGM, are guided by the same motto that signposted the way forward for our predecessors at the very first AGM in 1847 for the advancement of teachers and the promotion of sound learning.
"That motto has strongly stood the test of time. It’s lasted as a guiding principle to the EIS and its members for 179 years.”
"'For the advancement of teachers and the promotion of sound learning’- will be our collective creed as we navigate another ‘age of monsters’, to quote Gramsci, and a resurgence of the far right and the politics of hate and division, bank-rolled by billionaires whose avarice, hubris and complete lack of conscience are unfathomable, unconscionable to decent people.
“The wolves are no longer at the door, they’re in the door - as the recent Scottish Parliament election result attests.”
“We must continue to resist the profit before people economic paradigm that’s created a society riven with inequality, that sees our public services on their knees, including education, and our social security system in ruins, living standards in free-fall and levels of poverty and deprivation still rising...meaning that more and more of our young people are suffering serious educational disadvantage.”
“We need to be very careful to give no ground to the voices on the right that are now harping even louder for the dismantling of inclusive education and the abandonment of the presumption to mainstream.
“All of this is the architecture of the mega-wealth-holders who calculate that their interests can be best served by fanning the flames of racism, antisemitism, islamophobia, homophobia, transphobia, misogyny, ablism. All text-book tactics to try to divide – and conquer - working-class communities, ordinary people.”
“We’ve seen this in history before and we know where it leads if it’s allowed to go unchallenged.”
“So, the EIS does stand up and challenge the narratives of division and hate, and offers a hopeful alternative, at the same time as holding the UK and Scottish Governments to account on their failures to deliver for our citizens, their accountability for the sense of futility and fatalism that’s an absolute gift to the far-right.”
“Education is a critical antidote to the poison of far-right politics. We need a well-funded education system from Early Years to Higher education so that as teachers and lecturers, we can teach young people to read and write, to think and problem-solve and create... and so that we have what we need to educate the young people in our nurseries, schools, colleges and universities for equality, social justice, peace and democracy.”
“That’s what sound learning looks like. It’s how we build for a future of bread and roses and books - a future that rejects hate, a future that is hopeful.”
>Full text of Andrea Bradley’s speech