Consultation

Toilet provision at JGHS – results of parent survey

26 February 2026: Many thanks to those who submitted responses to the Parent Council survey about toilet provision at JGHS.

This survey was carried out to provide feedback to the City of Edinburgh Council about the changes in toilet and changing provision made in August 2025. This followed the UK Supreme Court’s ruling on the Equality Act 2010 that for the purposes of the Act, the term ‘sex’ refers to a persons’ sex assigned at birth only.

The School Premises (General Requirements and Standards) (Scotland) Regulations 1967 stipulate minimum numbers of toilet facilities that must be provided in schools and that those toilet facilities must be split between boys and girls. The effect of the Equality Act and the School Premises Regulations is that all schools must have separate male and female toilets and should also have gender neutral toilet provision.

To ensure the Council is acting lawfully, it was necessary to make changes to the school estate from August 2025. In all schools, transgender young people who previously used the toilet or changing facilities of the gender they identify with are no longer able to do so.

Although the Council did not have a choice about whether to make these changes, they want to understand the impact of the changes (positive or negative) and mitigate any negative impact, considering all protected characteristics* under the Equality Act 2010.

The JGHS Parent Council surveyed the views of parents in the School at the start of February 2026 and fed this back to the Council as part of the Council’s wider consultation about the impact of the changes. A summary of responses we received is presented below.

*Protected characteristics: age; gender reassignment; being married or in a civil partnership; being pregnant or on maternity leave; disability; race including colour, nationality, ethnic or national origin; religion or belief; sex; sexual orientation.

Question 1: Considering all the protected characteristics, note any positive impact of the changes in your school.

Parental feedback suggests a perception of positive impacts in relation to increased clarity and designation of male and female facilities.

In particular, some parents consider that clearly defined single-sex spaces may favourite privacy and dignity for girls and female pupils.

A smaller number of responses indicate that structured and clearly signposted provision, including gender-neutral and accessible options where available, may offer clarity within the school environment.

However, positive impacts were not consistently identified across protected characteristics.

Question 2: Considering all the protected characteristics, note any negative impact of the changes in your school.

Parental responses indicate that the most significant perceived negative impacts relate to pupils with the protected characteristic of gender reassignment.

Concerns were raised regarding safety, dignity, wellbeing, mental health, and the risk of stigma or exclusion.

Potential impacts were also identified for disabled pupils, particularly in relation to access to accessible facilities.

Overall, feedback suggests that certain protected groups may experience disproportionate impact and that these effects require careful monitoring.

Question 3: Do you have suggestions to mitigate any negative impacts noted above?

Parents suggested a range of mitigation measures.

These include:

maintaining and, where possible, expanding a mix of male, female, gender-neutral (including clearly defined single-occupancy where appropriate) and accessible facilities
improvements to privacy in existing facilities through appropriate design features
strengthened student support, ensuring pupils who feel anxious or distressed are supported sensitively
anti-bullying measures, staff training, clear communication, and continued engagement with affected pupils and families.

Ongoing monitoring of wellbeing and review of provision were identified as important to ensure that mitigation measures remain effective.

Survey re-opened

Although the survey was set up to collect feedbackfor the Council’s consultation, there was also considerable information submitted about broader issues of toilet provision at JGHS. The Parent Council is planning to share this with the JGHS leadership team to help inform action in the school.

As the timeframe for the previous survey was rather short, the feedback form has now been reopened. If you have any (further) comments you would like to share please submit via the link below:

Survey: Toilet and changing provision

If you have any comments about the survey or other issues more generally, please contact us by email:

Email JGHS Parent Council

City of Edinburgh Council consultation on mobile phones

January 2026: The Scottish Government published guidance on mobile phones in schools in August 2024.

Since this guidance, many schools, including JGHS, have introduced restrictions to mobile phone use during the school day. The detail of these restrictions can vary from school to school.

Mobile phone use in primary schools is not permitted following a decision by the Education, Children and Families Committee in 2025.

The Education, Children and Families Committee is considering banning or restricting phone use in all schools. The council is also considering lockable pouches to support restrictions on mobile phone use in secondary schools, and lockable cabinets in primary schools.

However the Council is aware that views on these proposals difffer and are now now asking for input from parents. They are also asking pupils and school staff and for their views. All the feedback will help the council reach a decision.

You can add your views to the consultation at the link below:

Submit your views to the consultation

Please complete the form by Monday 2 March 2026.

Scotland’s Next Steps in Education Reform

National bodies: qualifications and assessment

This week, the National Parent Forum of Scotland (NPFS) launched a survey to gather input from parents and carers across Scotland as a follow-up to conversations around education reform that have been ongoing throughout the last 12 months.

Have your say

This survey focuses on creating a new national body responsible for qualifications and assessment. It will remain open until Friday 8 December 2023.

Complete the NPFS survey

For background and further information, you can read the Scottish Government’s consultation paper on establishing a new qualifications body:

Education Bill provisions: consultation

You can also complete the official Scottish Government survey here:

Education Reform: A Consultation on the provisions of the Education Bill

Behaviour in Schools

9 June 2023: National Parent Forum of Scotland have received a number of comments in recent weeks regarding the rise in reports of concerning behaviour in our schools. They have launched a survey to gather real life experiences from parents across Scotland.

Feedback from this survey will be used to inform the NPFS contribution to the upcoming conversations around school behaviour with Scottish Government, as well as future policy discussions.

The survey will run until Thursday 22 June 2023. Please feel free to complete the survey multiple times to reflect the experiences of all the children/young people you care for, but please keep your feedback focussed on incidents during this school year – 2022-2023.

Complete the survey here

Learning Hours in Scottish Schools

Reminder – 23 May 2023: The Scottish Government has recently sent out a consultation paper for parents and carers asking for their opinion about the number of learning hours that should be set in law for young people in Scotland.

Prescribing the minimum annual number of learning hours: consultation

It is proposed that a specific number of hours of education should be provided by all local authorities in schools they have in their area. This will not include breaks, lunch or after school clubs. Currently in most schools, 950 hours of teaching time is provided in primary schools, and 1045 hours of teaching time in secondary schools.

Have your say

The National Parent Forum of Scotland has opened a survey to gather parent views on these proposals.

You can access the NPFS survey. The survey will be open until 26 May 2023 and the results will be shared with Scottish Government.

NPFS Learning Hours Survey

Scottish Government consultation on learning hours in schools

22 March 2023: The Scottish Government has launched a new consultation on prescribing the minimum annual number of learning hours in schools.

Prescribing the minimum annual number of learning hours: consultation

This consultation seeks views on the Scottish Government’s plans to set a legal minimum number of hours of school education school pupils should receive each year.

Traditionally, Scottish primary schools provide around 25 learning hours per week, and Scottish secondary schools around 27.5 hours per week. However, while local authorities are required to have their schools open for 190 days each year, the number of learning hours is not prescribed.

The Scottish Government is now planning to use the existing provisions in the Education (Scotland) Act 2016 to set the minimum number of learning hours in a school year, and propose to use this power to make regulations later this year.

Have your say

This consultation is an opportunity for local authorities, parents, children and young people and other stakeholders to provide views and evidence about the potential impact of the implementation of this policy.

Find out more and submit your views

The responses will be used to inform future regulations and non-statutory guidance.

The consultation closes on 13 June 2023.

Edinburgh City Council NE/SE Locality Meetings

12 February 2021: The Council’s NE/SE Locality meeting was held on 19 January 2021.

The main topics discussed were:

School session dates 2022/2025 – the Council will be sending out a questionnaire to parents, teachers and pupils looking at arrangements for school holidays up until 2025.

Remote Learning Provision – including the roll out of digital devices; the provision of Wifi to those without it; the availability of online teaching/learning resources; the approach to remote learning across Edinburgh schools.

A copy of the presentation can be found here:

NE/SE Locality Meetings January 2021

A note of the meeting can be found here:

NE/SE Locality Meeting 19 January 2021