By Professor John Robertson
BBC Reporting Scotland can barely contain themselves as they get a story of ‘staff’ on strike closing schools in John Swinney’s constituency, show him walking around a school, rather than the responsible local council chief and, in the online version, lead off with:
All of the primary schools in Perth and Kinross are closed after non-teaching school staff began strike action in First Minister John Swinney’s constituency.
The Reporting Scotland broadcast is careful to drop that ‘non-teaching‘ bit so that you might think teachers are out too, against the FM!
The directly responsible body, COSLA, is not ask for comment.
I return to the thought:
Why can support staff close a school in Scotland when it’s evident that they can’t in England?
See this from April 2024:
Thanks to Dottie again for alerting me to this, from the Observer today:
Headteachers are being forced to mend desks and unblock toilets themselves after sacking school caretakers in the wake of budget cuts, the Guardian has been told.
School leaders in England said they could not afford to employ caretakers, and were having to change lightbulbs and clear playgrounds of dead rats themselves.
Amanda Richards, the headteacher of Sytchampton primary in Worcestershire, said her school “literally can’t afford” a permanent caretaker, leaving her and other staff to move heavy equipment and make emergency repairs to keep the school running.
The clear implication is that you don’t legally have to have a janitor to run a school in England.
But, last September in the Guardian:
The Scottish government has been warned to anticipate more school strikes as thousands of pupils spent the first of three days at home on Tuesday.
Last-minute talks over the weekend had failed to halt the strike action by school support staff, closing hundreds of schools in 24 of the country’s 32 local authorities.
On Tuesday morning, busy picket lines were made up of support staff such as janitors, canteen workers, classroom assistants and cleaners, who said the dispute was prompted by years of underfunding and job cuts.
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/sep/26/scotland-support-staff-strike-schools-close-cuts
Are there any schools in Scotland with no jannie?
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Talking-up Scotland 'Albatraz' 
“Are there any schools in Scotland with no jannie?”
Probably not, but there are plenty who share a jannie. I worked in one in Aberdeenshire – we saw our jannie for two and a half days each week, yet somehow managed to remain open for the other two and a half…😉
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Damn it where did I see an article about city of Edinburgh councilllors having been overpaid, oh I know via the ‘Edinburgh reporter’ rag. I’ll see if I can find it online and share…
CEC council is run by Labour and Tories and Libdems is it not…
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Next it will be ‘Charter schools’ run by private companies paid for from the public purse as is the case in the US and I think India. The poorer kids (whose parents can’t afford to pay private education companies) attending those ‘schools’ are seriously under-educated.
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