ONLY four of Glasgow's 254 newly qualified teachers have been given full-time jobs in city schools, with neighbouring authorities doing little better in finding permanent posts for their class hopefuls.

ONLY four of Glasgow's 254 newly qualified teachers have been given full-time jobs in city schools, with neighbouring authorities doing little better in finding permanent posts for their class hopefuls.

One - Renfrewshire - has employed NONE of its 172 teachers who have just completed their probationary year.

North and South Lanarkshire, which have the best record, have together taken on 119 out of their 512 probationers.

The figures, obtained by the Evening Times today, show the lack of opportunities in schools has left hundreds of teachers across the west of Scotland out of work - at best languishing on long supply lists waiting for temporary work.

Student teachers are all guaranteed a year's paid probation when they graduate from teaching courses.

But the figures today show how after that year most of them are effectively on the scrapheap.

Scotland's biggest teaching union branded the situation "unacceptable".

Brian Cooper, of teachers' union the Educational Institute of Scotland, said: "It's always been the case that not every teacher walked into a post but this year there is a far larger percentage in this position.

"When you look at the figures for Glasgow, it is unacceptable so many new teachers who were placed in city schools are now being forced on to emergency supply lists with little hope of full-time work. It is profoundly unfair."

Our analysis shows 11 councils in the west of Scotland jointly took on only 209 teachers - or 12% - of the 1687 they had completing their probationary year in their schools.

The Scottish Government predicts around 6000 vacancies will be created in Scotland by the end of 2008/09 as teachers retire.

But that is no comfort to the hundreds of qualified teachers currently struggling to find work.

In Glasgow, the council employed four secondary school teachers in English and Maths from last year's probationers but has not even advertised one post in its primaries.

A spokeswoman for Glasgow City Council said: "We have sufficient teachers to meet our needs. Should that situation change, we will of course recruit however many additional teachers are required."

In East Renfrewshire, the competition has been so fierce for places that one school, Mearns Primary, had 325 candidates apply for one job.

John Wilson, director of education for East Renfrewshire Council, said: "We are simply unable to employ more than a few of the many excellent newly-qualified teachers who were with us last year.

"My worry is that we will be losing the talent from Scottish schools as many are electing to go abroad to work."

Mr Cooper agrees, saying Australia and Canada are "poaching" newly-qualified teachers.

He added: "It will be a disaster for Scotland if we come to a situation in a few years' time when the many thousands of retirals which are predicted occur and we don't have any trained teachers to fill their positions."

The shortfall in available posts is attributed to factors, including councils' unwillingness to reduce class sizes in line with Scottish Government guidelines, a lack of funding and the policy forcing schools to give a year's probation to teachers on graduation.

Teachers are employed by the local authorities which are pleading poverty despite Holyrood insisting additional money was allocated.

But the funding was not ring-fenced, so councils cannot be forced to spend the cash on cutting class sizes and employing more teachers.

A Scottish Government spokeswoman said: "We would not expect all teachers to have secured posts by this month as vacancies occur continually.

"This is factored into teacher workforce planning - as is the requirement to have a sufficient provision of supply teachers.

"We will be monitoring the post-probationer employment situation through the next General Teaching Council Scotland survey due in October.

"We have made clear that there will be a steady flow of employment opportunities due to retirals this year.

"It is expected that across Scotland around 6000 teachers will leave the profession this year - almost 400 more than last year - and we expect similar numbers to leave in the years ahead."

The spokeswoman said the Scottish Government would continue to work closely with COSLA, GTCS and local authority employers to ensure that arrangements for teacher workforce planning were robust.

"We have also set up a working group to look at this issue which will report in autumn."

The concordat between the Scottish Government and local government contains an agreement to deliver year on year progress in reducing class sizes.

The aim is to reduce class sizes in P1 to P3 to a maximum of 18 as quickly as possible.