Meeting of the Parliament 01 October 2025 [Draft]
Presiding Officer,
“It helped me focus.”
“Fights and bullying at breaks have got better—because no one has their phones in class to organise them.”
“I spend more time talking to my friends now.”
“I’m glad the temptation to go on my phone has gone.”
That is what young people told me about a ban on mobile phones in school classrooms when I met them last week, and that is why Scottish Labour has lodged a straightforward motion with a straightforward purpose: to ban mobile phones for learners in classrooms across Scotland in order to help to make classrooms calm and safe places to learn. We propose that because education is crucial. It is the ladder to opportunity for all, and it is our job to move anything that stands in the way of that vital goal.
All colleagues across the chamber know that there are many obstacles to that goal and that the atmosphere in too many classrooms is challenging for learning and teaching. Teachers are overworked and are firefighting disruption. The scaffolding that should be there to hold our young people up—timely mental health support, speech and language services and educational psychologists—has all been stretched thin, and in some cases it is non-existent. Bullying is up by nearly 200 per cent in just five years. A School Leaders Scotland survey found that pupil behaviour is increasingly difficult to manage, and the Government’s behaviour in Scottish schools research cites phones and social media as a factor, recognising that they are seriously disruptive.
Amid all of that, we are still allowing that disruption in classes and letting the online world pour into the school day through the rectangle in a young person’s pocket, with the constant of notifications, group chats, viral clickbait and rising amounts of harmful content. The cabinet secretary says that headteachers are empowered to end that if they see fit, but that is not leadership; that is passing the buck. Local delivery is indeed crucial, but it is the Government’s job to set clear expectations, and that is why I cannot accept the Government’s amendment to the motion. It leaves us where we are now, and I am not prepared to stand still on the future for our young people.
The pupils I met last week told me that, when the temptation is removed, they talk to their friends more, they concentrate more, they feel calmer and they can hear themselves think. A national ban on phones in class would free young people and empower staff and parents. It would change the temperature in the room and draw a sensible boundary during lessons so that pupils can concentrate and teachers can teach. Importantly, it can be implemented in a way that involves young people, engages parents and empowers schools. Leaving it up to headteachers lacks leadership and passes the buck.
Where the Government has failed to lead, schools have stepped in. In Portobello, the model is simple and it is delivered in a rights-protecting way. Pupils keep their property, but it is locked in a pouch for class and unlocked at lunch—not at break. Pupils can unlock it to call home if they need to, and pupils who need more regular access to their phones—for example, pupils with additional support needs or caring responsibilities and some pupils in the senior phase who might need messages about work—can access them. In Notre Dame high school in Glasgow, staff and pupils manage a clear off and away rule, together with classroom routines that everyone understands. Those are two different models with the same outcomes: more attention, fewer flashpoints and more time on task.
However, leadership cannot stop at the school gate. The Government issued guidance and then shrugged. We therefore have a postcode lottery, with teachers left to bear the weight of that crucial decision and parents left to navigate mixed messages. Empowerment without direction is abdication, and our motion corrects that.