Scottish Education secretary must ‘repair rift with councils’
Education directors in Scotland have advised that the new education secretary John Swinney must rebuild the government’s broken relationship with councils, following budget cuts.
The news comes after Deputy first minister John Swinney was appointed as education secretary last week. Head teachers, education directors and academics have agreed that Swinney will help bring ‘gravitas’ to the role and help to keep education high on the political agenda.
The SNP manifesto, published last month, called into question the future role of councils in the delivery of education: it vowed to ‘extend to individual schools responsibilities that currently sit solely with local authorities’ and ‘allocate more resources directly to headteachers’.
John Stodter, general secretary of the Association of Directors of Education in Scotland, said: “The local authorities are the education authorities and the first step will be to make sure all the politicians are fully engaged with the idea of working together to get improvement."
Read moreLatest News
19/12/2025 - 09:54
The Education Committee has expanded its ongoing inquiry into the early years sector to examine how safeguarding can be strengthened in early years settings.
18/12/2025 - 09:25
The UK will be rejoining the Erasmus programme in 2027, following a package of agreements with the EU.
17/12/2025 - 09:31
Ofqual has fined exam board Pearson more than £2 million in total for serious breaches in three separate cases between 2019 and 2023 which collectively affected tens of thousands of students.
16/12/2025 - 09:19
The average funding rates will increase by 4.3% for under 2s, and by almost 5% for 3-and-4-year-olds.
15/12/2025 - 10:30
Local colleges are set to receive £570 million in government funding to expand training facilities in areas such as construction and engineering.
