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New pay offer expected in Scottish teacher strikes

A new salary offer is set to be made next week to try to resolve the teachers’ strikes in Scotland.

Scotland’s largest teachers’ union, EIS, said any new offer would need to be significantly improved before action was abandoned.

The unions want a 10% pay rise, but the current deal is worth between 5% and 6.85% for most workers.

Teachers have held a series of strikes across Scotland since November and more are scheduled for later this month.

Council leaders are expecting to hear on Monday whether the Scottish Government will give them money to increase the existing salary offer.

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If so, they will hold a meeting later in the week to agree a new deal before it goes before the unions.

At the heart of the pay dispute is the pay rise teachers were supposed to receive in April last year.

Any offer must be affordable for all 32 Scottish communities.

Their hope would be that the new offer would result in a suspension of strike action while a two-year wage deal – which would also cover the 2023 wage offer – was negotiated.

The latest salary offer was made ahead of the EIS’ first strike in November last year. Since then, the EIS and other unions have conducted a series of strikes.

Almost all pupils in Scotland have lost three or four days of school.

The next nationwide strike is due on February 28th and March 1st.

The EIS is also planning targeted strikes at schools in a number of areas – including First Minister Nicola Sturgeon’s Glasgow constituency.

Education Secretary Shirley-Anne Somerville said: “We are committed to resolving this dispute as quickly as possible and are continuing to work on an improved offering for teaching unions.”

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