Why is teacher sickness absence rising in French-speaking Belgium?

French-speaking education unions called for stronger protests on 1 September after talks with Education Minister Valérie Glatigny failed to resolve their dispute over savings measures, including an increase in upper-secondary teaching duties from 20 to 22 periods a week. BX1 reported the breakdown in negotiations; the government’s budget announcement sets out the workload change. The confrontation leaves schools in the Wallonia-Brussels Federation facing a difficult question: how can they sustain classroom staffing when sickness absence has already risen? [BX1’s account of the talks](https://bx1.be/categories/news/les-syndicats-appellent-a-durcir-le-mouvement-apres-la-rencontre-avec-valerie-glatigny-jai-perdu-mon-temps/)

The clearest annual comparison verified for this article predates the current school year. The French Community parliament’s documentation service records an increase in average teacher sickness absence from 6.2% in 2019–20 to 8.2% in 2024–25. That is two percentage points, or approximately one-third relative to the earlier rate. It is a substantial deterioration, but it should not be presented as a measurement of what has happened since this summer’s return to school. [Parliamentary documentation](https://documentation.pfwb.be/index.php?id=231444&lvl=notice_display)

Nor does a sickness-absence rate directly tell parents how many lessons their children have missed. An absent teacher may have a replacement; an uncovered vacancy may exist without anyone being off sick. School staffing figures also count different populations. BX1 and Belga reported in September 2025 that the share of paid teaching equivalents outside the classroom had risen from 6.3% in 2017–18 to 9% in 2023–24. That broader category included secondments, maternity leave, arrangements preceding retirement and medical situations. Calling all of it sickness absence would misrepresent the evidence. [BX1 on staffing categories](https://bx1.be/categories/news/pres-dun-enseignant-temps-plein-remunere-sur-dix-nest-pas-en-classe-en-federation-wallonie-bruxelles/)

For families, the practical issue is continuity. If cover cannot be found, pupils risk losing subject teaching or needing additional help later. Parents may have to rearrange work if school arrangements change, or consider tutoring they had not budgeted for. These are possible consequences, not costs measured by the absence statistics. For school leaders, the corresponding questions concern replacement availability, colleagues’ workloads and the time spent rebuilding timetables. A useful account of the problem therefore needs both staff-health data and evidence about what happens to pupils during absences.

The pressure also extends beyond illness. In an August report, BX1 cited a Federation–University of Liège study following entrants to teaching in 2017–18: 66.3% remained active five years later, while 33.7% had left. The broadcaster described early careers split between temporary contracts and different schools. Education sociologist Hugues Draelants of UCLouvain told BX1 that teachers also face increasingly complex social and disciplinary demands. These findings help explain why maintaining a workforce involves more than recruiting enough people at the start of September. They do not establish how much of the sickness increase any particular working condition caused. [BX1’s workforce report](https://bx1.be/categories/news/etre-enseignant-en-federation-wallonie-bruxelles-ca-attire-toujours/)

The government approaches the problem through resource allocation as well as recruitment. Its October 2025 budget announcement presented the increase from 20 to 22 teaching periods as a way to harmonise workloads, alongside reducing pedagogical secondments to return staff to classrooms. It also announced lighter teaching duties at the beginning and end of careers. These were the government’s stated policy choices and objectives; the announcement does not demonstrate their eventual effect on sickness or retention. [Federation budget announcement](https://gouvernement.cfwb.be/home/presse--actualites/communiques-de-presse/presses/budget-2026-2029-accord-au-gouvernement-de-la-federation-wallonie-bruxelles-pour-garder-sous-controle-le-deficit-budgetaire.html)

The CSC-Enseignement and CGSP-Enseignement see a different risk. When the package was announced, CSC leader Roland Lahaye warned that it would damage educational quality, according to BX1 and Belga. Their objection makes the economic tension clear: asking existing employees to teach more can increase scheduled capacity, but whether it produces durable capacity depends on attendance, retention and workable conditions. That is an analytical distinction, rather than proof that the reform will succeed or fail. [BX1 on the unions’ response](https://bx1.be/categories/news/budget-fwb-on-ne-va-pas-se-laisser-faire-avertissent-les-syndicats-enseignants/)

The longer history discourages a single explanation. In March 2018, BX1 reported then-minister Marie-Martine Schyns’s figures showing that teachers aged 50–65 accounted for 44% of absences while representing 31% of the workforce. The sustainability of a teaching career was already a policy concern. Yet absence has not increased in every period: BX1 reported that January’s rate fell from 7.39% in 2020 to 5.57% in 2021. Those observations underline why age, season and the period selected matter when interpreting a headline trend. [BX1’s 2018 report](https://bx1.be/categories/news/labsenteisme-profs-de-plus-de-50-ans-hausse/), [BX1’s 2021 comparison](https://bx1.be/categories/news/labsenteisme-des-enseignants-en-baisse-par-rapport-a-2019-malgre-la-pandemie/)

There is also a practical precedent to examine. In the September 2025 parliamentary debate, Glatigny said replacement pools in nursery and primary education had been extended to Namur and Walloon Brabant. The next useful evidence would show whether such arrangements improve cover, and where gaps remain. An aggregate Federation rate cannot answer that question for an individual school in Brussels or Wallonia. [Education committee record](https://archive.pfwb.be/1000000020dd052)

BX1 reports that unions have scheduled a demonstration in Liège on 10 September and that Glatigny intends to invite them back on 13 October. Beyond those dates, the essential test is whether schools can deliver more reliable teaching while keeping staff healthy enough to remain in the profession. Comparable figures for the newer school years, replacement coverage and actual lessons missed are needed before anyone can credibly declare that the current policies have changed the trend.