Labour accuses SNP of betraying teachers

Published on Saturday 13 June 2009 20:03

LABOUR accused the SNP government of betraying newly qualified teachers last night as it claimed hundreds were being forced to compete for single posts.

Figures obtained by the party revealed there were 500 applications for a primary job advertised in North Lanarkshire earlier this year. It said an average of 239 teachers were applying for vacancies in the local authority.

Labour's education spokeswoman Rhona Brankin described the figures as "horrifying" and warned that teaching graduates would be forced to find work in England or abroad.

Brankin said: "(Education secretary] Fiona Hyslop's handling of the teacher recruitment crisis is shameful.

"To add insult to injury the Scottish Government's website is still carrying adverts encouraging people to train as teachers.

"Fiona Hyslop is guilty of serious betrayal of those enticed into teacher training when teaching posts across Scotland are being cut under her watch – by nearly a thousand last year alone."

A recent survey by the General Teaching Council in Scotland found that only about a third of new teachers had secured full-time permanent work almost a year after qualifying.

Figures showed that nine out of ten new teachers were in some form of employment, including part-time, supply and temporary work. The number of teachers with no job at all halved over the last six months.

Hyslop said of Labour's comments: "They are conveniently forgetting that teacher numbers were higher in 2007 and 2008 under the SNP than in all but one year of the Labour/Liberal administration, while pupil-teacher ratios in Scotland are at a record low.

"The latest GTCS figures show 89 per cent of newly qualified teachers are employed in teaching – up 10.4 per cent since last autumn, and the percentage of post-probation teachers not in employment has fallen from 21 per cent to 10.6 per cent."