What a teacher cannot be required to do

The School Teachers’ Pay and Conditions Document sets out duties a teacher may be required to do, and a shorter list of things the school cannot require. For maintained schools in England, the 2026 version says teachers cannot be required to work weekends or public holidays, supervise pupils at midday, or routinely take on admin that does not need a teacher’s skills. Cover for absent colleagues should happen only rarely, and only when it could not be foreseen.

Weekends and public holidays

No teacher, including leaders, can be required to work on a Saturday, Sunday or public holiday unless their contract expressly provides for it, as it might for residential establishments. There are two exceptions. One is a genuine emergency that could not reasonably have been anticipated, prevented or delegated, and the document says this does not include routine cover or pressure from ordinary operations. The other is activity you volunteered for, such as supervising a school trip.

Midday supervision

No teacher or leader can be required under their contract to supervise pupils at lunchtime.

Cover for absent colleagues

Supervising and, where practicable, teaching a class when the timetabled teacher is not available is a listed duty. The document then says teachers should be asked to provide cover only rarely, and only in circumstances that are not foreseeable. That does not apply to teachers employed wholly or mainly to provide cover. If cover is a regular, planned part of your week, the wording gives you something concrete to raise with the head.

Administrative tasks

A teacher should not be required routinely to take part in administrative, clerical and organisational tasks that do not call for a teacher’s professional skills and judgement, including invigilating external exams. Annex 6 of the 2026 document lists 23 examples. They include:

• collecting money from pupils and parents
• bulk photocopying
• ordering supplies and equipment
• keeping and filing records
• administering cover for absent teachers
• putting up and taking down classroom displays

Some of these tasks may still call for professional judgement in a particular case, and the document sets out a process for deciding that. Many of these jobs are done by school office and support staff, and the school administrator profile shows what that work looks like.

Breaks and planning time

A teacher who must be available for more than one school session in a day must be allowed a break of reasonable length, between sessions or between 12 noon and 2pm. Break time and travel do not count towards the 1,265 hours of directed time.

Planning, preparation and assessment (PPA) time is a guaranteed part of those hours. It must come in units of at least half an hour during the timetabled teaching week and must amount to at least 10 per cent of your timetabled teaching time. If you and the head agree, it can be taken as one weekly block and away from the school site. You cannot be given other duties in that time. A teacher with leadership or management responsibilities is also entitled, so far as is reasonably practicable, to a reasonable amount of time in school sessions for those duties.

Early career teachers have a further protection: they cannot be asked to teach more than 90 per cent of a colleague’s timetable for the first three school terms of induction, or 95 per cent for the rest. See the ECT induction guide.

Work beyond directed time

The directed time covers 1,265 hours across the year. The document also expects teachers to work the reasonable additional hours needed to do the job properly, such as planning lessons and marking. The employer must not decide how many of these hours or when they are worked. The teaching workload guide discusses what that looks like in practice.

What to check

• Look at your contract and any staff handbook to see whether the school has agreed to these limits, particularly in an academy.
• Check your timetable for the PPA minimum: 10 per cent of timetabled teaching time, in units of half an hour or more.
• If cover is a weekly fixture, note the dates and raise it with your head, or through your union rep.
• Keep any request to work a weekend or holiday in writing.