Meeting of the Parliament 31 May 2023
To be frank, I do not know. I hear reports of teachers who really struggle to cope with a variety of demands. I think that they would love to have great diversity in their classes so that every single child gets opportunities, but we should challenge that to make sure that it is the right decision. That is what I think the debate today helps with.
Every member in the Parliament has been around a school and has seen, as the cabinet secretary highlighted, the joy of learning. We are proud of so many of our pupils, teachers and—we should not forget them—the other members of staff in the school, who do brilliant jobs. However, our job in Parliament is to challenge. We should be impatient for improvement, so that when we challenge it, it is not because we are against the education system or against schools, pupils, teachers or staff but because we want improvement.
We should be hungry for that change, which is why I will repeatedly challenge the Government on casualisation of the workforce, especially in primary schools, where young people often go for six years on the trot having teachers who are on one temporary contract after the other. It is just demoralising. Those teachers thought that they were going to be able to craft young minds to be the workforce of the future, but they are really just struggling to stay alive in the teaching profession. That is why so many of them are leaving their positions.