Created on: 30 May 2025
Despite various commitments made for over a decade, the Scottish Government and COSLA have failed to make tangible progress in tackling the unsustainable levels of workload endured by teachers across Scotland.
This member briefing tracks these unmet commitments ahead of the EIS consultative ballot for industrial action on workload opening on 6th June 2025.
Following pressure, and sustained campaigning from the EIS, the Scottish Government established a working group on tackling unnecessary bureaucracy associated with the implementation of Curriculum for Excellence. The report of this working group was published in 2013.
Central to the key messages and actions within the report was the need for professional trust in teachers and for commitment to be made to ensuring teachers feeling empowered. Despite this, many of the issues that the working group considered persist.
Following the mobilisation of the EIS membership in the Value Education, Value Teachers campaign, the resulting agreement contained an acknowledgement of unsustainable workload and a joint commitment to addressing the issue.
As members of the SNCT, both the Scottish Government and COSLA, signed up to this commitment. However, it again failed to result in sustained action in addressing workload.
Again, following pressure from the EIS, while seeking re-election in 2021, the SNP manifesto carried a clear promise to the Scottish electorate to reduce weekly class contact time for teachers to a maximum of 21 hours, in acknowledgement of high levels of teacher workload.
It is now over four years since this promise to the electorate was made, and despite consistent effort on the part of the EIS and the SNCT Teachers’ Panel, the Scottish Government and COSLA have failed to match words of commitment on this issue with concrete action.
As part of the Stand Up for Quality Education Campaign, the EIS commissioned independent research into the issue of unsustainable teacher workload. The findings laid bare the impact of workload on teacher health and wellbeing, as well as the extent to which teachers were carrying out the tasks, unpaid and above their contracted hours, that should be undertaken in “preparation and correction” time.
After over ten years of failing to do so, it is time that Scottish Government and COSLA act to materially address workload. The full reduction of weekly class contact time to 21 hours must be allocated to teachers' "preparation and correction" time otherwise workload will be worse, not better.
The actions of EIS members will be central to securing this essential step forward in addressing intolerable levels of workload that have been unfair, unhealthy and unsustainable for more than a decade. Remember- when EIS members act together, they win.
Vote YES to strike action and YES to Action Short of Strike in the Workload Ballot opening on 6th June, 2025!