TEACHERS in East Lothian took the fourth highest number of days off sick, according to a report on local authority employees.

The report by the Accounts Commission named East Lothian Council’s secondary school teaching staff as taking on average nearly nine days off each year and primary school staff nearly seven, compared to a national average of just over six days.

It placed the council’s sick leave among its schools higher than 28 other local authorities. Clackmannanshire had the highest number of sick days at 10, followed by Eilean Siar and South Ayrshire, before East Lothian.

The figures were revealed at a meeting of East Lothian Council’s audit and governance committee this week in the Town House, Haddington.

Officials said work was under way to tackle the high number of sickness absences among teachers and it was already in decline.

The report also revealed the number of days taken as sick leave by council workers who were not teachers was just over 10 annually, only slightly above average and placing them in the middle of the results from other local authorities.

East Lothian Council said the figures in the report were based on the year 2014/2015 and they were improving.

A council spokesperson said: “We are working with schools for a consistent approach to absence management. The absence figures for this financial year have improved from the previous year, with figures to April showing primary teacher absences down from 8.71 days lost per full-time teacher to 6.68 and secondaries down from 6.75 to 6.34.

“The council is reviewing the managing attendance policy and guidance to achieve continued improvements and we hope to have the revised policy approved at the cabinet meeting in September.”