Workload and working hours

The number of hours for which teachers can be directed to teach or undertake other professional duties is subject to a limit of 1,265. On top of this teachers are expected to work ‘reasonable additional hours’ to fulfil their professional responsibilities. 

Teachers in the UK continue to work more intensively and for longer hours than any other profession. There is no better time to act to reduce workload in your workplace.

Stress and exhaustion are not only the products of excessive working hours but also of having too little professional discretion in your workplace - with key decisions about the curriculum and teaching strategies taken out of your professional control. 

Big win for the NEU on pay and workload

Education unions have responded to the publication of initial recommendations by the Workload Reduction Taskforce to reduce workload for school leaders and teachers – including an end to performance-related pay.

Government will remove the requirement for schools to use performance related pay for teachers, breaking the automatic link between the appraisal process and pay rises. They will consult with a view to doing this from September 2024.

The Government will also add a list of administrative and clerical tasks into the teacher contract that you should not be required to do, again from September. This will include things like preparing files of evidence for Ofsted inspections, reformatting or re-entry of data, putting up classroom displays, paperwork related to school visits and investigating pupil absence. It will be made clear to SLTs that teachers shouldn’t be asked to do things that don’t require their professional skills or judgement.

As a result of the strike action you took last year, the Government said it would begin talks with unions about ways to make meaningful reductions to teachers’ workload. These are significant wins which will have a real impact on teachers’ working lives.

Watch and share this film which describes the concessions we have won.