For too long maternity pay for teachers has been too poor.Today our Labour government is taking a first step towards changing that — doubling the number of weeks at full pay.With Labour, change is coming for school staff.www.lbc.co.uk/article/teac…

— Bridget Phillipson MP (@bphillipsonmp.bsky.social) 2026-02-21T11:07:16.131Z

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Thanks to Dottie for alerting me to this.

Doubling, Bridget? Doubling what?

Teachers, leaders and support staff will see their full maternity pay double from the 2027-28 academic year, rising from four weeks to eight, the Department for Education (DfE) has said.

^{https://www.lbc.co.uk/article/teachers-maternity-pay-boosted-5HjdSZr_2/}

I don’t suppose Bridget had her staff check the situation in Scotland. No, why would they?

What is it? 13 weeks full pay.

^{https://www.snct.org.uk/wiki/index.php?title=Part_2_Section_7}

So Scottish teachers used to get more than three times as many weeks off on full maternity pay and now it’s just 5 weeks more?

Hey, that makes me think, are there any other ways in which Scottish teachers are better off?

Just these:

Scottish teachers have enjoyed by far the best pupil/teacher ratio and consequent workload in the UK for at least 15 years now

‘I’d rather be a teacher in Scotland than England’ – research review confirms the sense in this

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