Labour has called for a national mobile phone ban in Scotland’s schools, with ministers accused of having “dithered” and “passed the buck” on the issue.
The party’s education spokeswoman Pam Duncan-Glancy said pupils are being left to “pay the price” for SNP ministers’ lack of action on the issue.
She was speaking as Holyrood debated what Labour said was a “straight-forward motion with a straight-forward purpose”, calling for mobile phones to be banned in classrooms across the country to help make schools “calm and safe places to learn”.
With concerns rising about behaviour in Scotland’s schools, Ms Duncan-Glancy argued teachers are “firefighting disruption”.
Education Secretary Jenny Gilruth said the Scottish Government has issued guidance to schools which means “head teachers are already empowered to carry out mobile phone bans” if they see fit to do so.
“I have to ask why Scottish Labour don’t trust our head teachers to do that?,” the minister said.
“It’s not for me sitting in an office in Edinburgh to dictate to Scotland’s teachers. Why do the Labour Party think they know better than Scotland’s teachers?”
She said it is not her experience that “pupils would routinely be sitting with their phones out in class” – adding this is “quite unlike” the situation with MSPs in Holyrood’s chamber.
Ms Gilruth agreed mobile phones “can be a distraction to learning and teaching”, but stressed it is local authorities who are responsible for running schools – “not the Scottish Government”.
The Education Secretary added: “The position of our guidance is that we trust Scotland’s head teachers to take the action they consider necessary, including a mobile phone ban across the school day.”
Ms Duncan-Glancy claimed the Government had “issued guidance and then shrugged”, leaving it to individual councils and schools to deal with the issue.
Parents and teachers have told us time and again that banning mobile phones would improve our education system overnight.
— Pam Duncan-Glancy MSP (@GlasgowPam) October 1, 2025
It's time for the SNP to listen. pic.twitter.com/fWqJJx6Dz5
She said: “We now have a postcode lottery with teachers left to bear the weight of this crucial decision.
“What we’re asking for is national clarity – no phones in class for learners.”
She said banning phones for pupils in class would be a “practical, proportionate step”.
Ms Duncan-Glancy added: “The Government has dithered and the Government has delayed. Schools have improvised, parents have worried, and pupils have paid the price.”
She said schools can “keep muddling through” with the current guidance, or instead the Government could “set a clear expectation that every child in Scotland deserves a calm, phone-free lesson as standard, not as a postcode perk”.
Conservative education spokesman Miles Briggs also backed a national ban, saying: “In too many cases, our school environments have become toxic with students and teachers experiencing stress, bullying and other negative behaviours, and often at the heart of that can be mobile phones.
“I welcome the fact that there does now seem to be a clear consensus across Parliament that we want to send out a clear message that we want a ban on mobile phones in classrooms, and that is what we want all 32 councils to implement.”
