Meeting of the Parliament 22 January 2025
I am grateful to be able to speak on such an important issue. Violent and disruptive behaviour in Scotland’s schools has become an epidemic. In 2023 alone, school staff reported almost 45,000 instances of violence and abuse, with 200 staff being physically or verbally abused every day. Another survey found that 70 per cent of Scottish pupils experience sexual harassment, with 34 per cent experiencing unwanted touching. Think about that for a moment. One in three pupils is being touched against their will, seven in 10 pupils experience harassment of some kind, and a physical or verbal assault against staff takes place every two minutes of a school day.
The violence in Scotland’s schools is out of control. The SNP Government needs to do far more to help teachers to tackle this growing crisis, and my colleague Miles Briggs has already set out some of the actions that it must take.
I want to focus on the impact that that violence is having on young girls. We know that the vast majority of pupils experiencing sexual harassment are girls. We know that 20 per cent of girls no longer feel safe at school and that half of those say that their fear is holding them back in their education.
Last month, I held a round-table session on the 16 days of activism against gender-based violence. One of the guests was a teacher who recounted some of the shocking incidents that had taken place at her school. She described boys having a group chat in which they rated girls and photoshopped their heads on to fake bodies. Most appallingly, she said, the boys took advantage of unisex toilets to sneak their phones under the stalls and film girls. Sadly, that is not the first time that such an incident has happened. Recently, a hidden camera that had filmed hundreds of naked girls was found in a unisex toilet stall in a Dundee school. However, when the teacher I spoke to raised concerns about the mixed-sex toilets, she was branded transphobic.
Raising concerns about girls facing sexual harassment in mixed-sex toilets is not transphobic; it is common sense. It is a bare-minimum safeguard that young girls deserve, yet one in 20 schools in Scotland currently offers only mixed-sex facilities, with no single-sex toilets at all. It is no wonder that so many girls feel unsafe at school when even toilets and changing rooms are no longer safe spaces. That is why it is vital that single-sex facilities are available in every school.
The SNP must do more to support teachers to tackle sexual harassment and violence. That includes empowering teachers to discipline violent pupils and put an end to the terror that many girls live with. Schools should be environments where pupils feel safe and enjoy their childhood. Unfortunately, that is not the case in Scotland under the SNP Government. A generation of children are having their education disrupted, while a generation of girls are learning to fear sexual harassment every day. Talking shop will no longer cut it. We need real action to tackle this crisis.
15:21