Belgium: Education Unions Extend Strike Notice to 16 October

Education unions in Belgium’s francophone community have extended their strike notice until Friday 16 October, keeping schools across the Federation Wallonia-Brussels (FWB) in a state of sustained industrial action and prolonging a months-long confrontation with the MR-Les Engagés government.

The socialist and Christian unions announced the decision on Tuesday, according to RTBF. The previous notice had been due to expire on 27 September. A series of regional actions is already planned between 1 and 16 October — the eve of the Toussaint, or autumn, school holidays — and the unions have reserved the right to extend the notice further.

A Common Front

The decision was taken jointly by the three main unions grouped in a common front: CSC-Enseignement (Christian), CGSP (socialist, part of the FGTB) and Setca-SEL. In a joint statement, they framed the extension as a response to the government’s “inaction” and the “contradictions” of the ministers responsible for the file, Elisabeth Degryse and Valérie Glatigny.

“Faced with the government’s inaction and the contradictions of the responsible ministers Elisabeth Degryse and Valérie Glatigny, our union organisations have decided to extend the notice until Friday 16 October next,” the unions said, as reported by La Libre Belgique.

The statement added a condition: “An evaluation will take place at the end of this period of action. Without notable shifts in the policy put in place and decided by the government and a return to social consultation, our organisations reserve the right to extend the notice after the autumn holidays.”

Picket at Auderghem

On Tuesday morning, a filtering picket was held from 07h30 in front of the Athénée Royal d’Auderghem in Brussels, led by a Brussels common front bringing together CSC and FGTB-CGSP, according to La Libre Belgique. Other Brussels schools were also mobilised. The school was chosen, unions said, because it has been strongly mobilised since last year, and teachers from other Brussels schools joined the picket.

At the picket, union representatives denounced a lack of dialogue with Education Minister Valérie Glatigny (MR). “Ms Glatigny does not listen. She is absolutely not on the ground. She has her line and she charges ahead,” said Magali Moyart, Brussels regional secretary at CGSP-Enseignement.

Damien Kreutz, a union officer at CSC-Enseignement, was blunter. “Everything we had denounced is happening,” he said. “The consequences are very real on the ground. Teachers are being forced to cover more schools. Many people are thinking of leaving the profession for all these reasons.” He added that the minister would push her reform “whatever it takes.”

Teachers also voiced concerns about being reassigned outside their fields of training. One teacher, originally trained in visual arts, said she had been asked to teach music this school year. “Eventually we’ll lose all specialties. We’ll lose specialists. It’s worrying,” she told Belga. Unions at the school described “women and men who see their working conditions deteriorating and their professional future [at stake].”

The Budget Behind the Dispute

The confrontation has its roots in the FWB’s structural deficit. The francophone community — responsible for education, culture, youth, sport, research and early childhood — had to reduce a deficit heading toward €1.6 billion in 2026 down to around €1.2 billion per year, via a plan of €500 million in savings over four years, RTBF reports. Education accounts for roughly 70% of the FWB budget, making it the principal target.

The measures that emerged have drawn sustained opposition. They include a 10% increase in the teaching load of upper-secondary teachers without salary compensation, a less generous sick-leave regime for statutory teachers, and a tightening of end-of-career arrangements known as DPPR. The programme decree also raises the enrolment fee, or minerval, from €835 to €1,194 for 58% of students from the next school year, while budgets for school supplies and free meals are trimmed.

Unions argue the changes fall hardest on temporary staff and on teachers whose assignments no longer match their training. They also point to new curricula being introduced, in their words, amid “uncertainty and pedagogical groping.”

Months of Escalation

The dispute has escalated steadily over the past year. The programme decree containing the education savings was validated in the Budget committee in the night of 1 to 2 June 2026, prompting sharp protests from the opposition parties PS, PTB and Ecolo, including a disputed fast-tracked plenary vote and accusations of an “irregular and illegal” procedure. The opposition demanded the resignation of FWB parliament president Benoît Dispa, and unions called a strike for that Thursday. RTBF’s explainer notes that some schools had already announced that end-of-year internal exams would be cancelled.

Through 2025 and 2026, the mobilisation grew: rotating strikes, the emergence in March 2026 of a school and teacher collective named “Mars Attacks!”, and the participation of parents and pupils. The most recent show of force came on 10 September 2026, when the common union front organised a demonstration in Liège that gathered between 10,000 and 13,000 people, according to RTBF. Local outlet Qu4tre Liège Média reported “13,000 participants according to the unions, fewer according to police estimates.”

Analysis: A Deadlock With a Deadline

The extension of the notice is less an escalation than a strategic holding pattern. By stretching the action to 16 October, unions keep the pressure on through a fresh sequence of regional actions while leaving the government a window — however narrow — to reopen social consultation before the autumn holidays. The explicit threat to extend beyond the holidays is the leverage.

For the government, the calculus is constrained by the deficit. With education consuming about 70% of the FWB budget, meaningful savings are difficult to find without touching the teaching corps, and the MR-Les Engagés majority has so far shown no appetite for the retreat the unions are demanding. The standoff thus pits the fiscal imperative of a region with limited tax room against a profession that says its working conditions and its specialist ranks are being eroded.

Two features distinguish this dispute from a routine pay fight. First, it has become entangled with a broader argument over FWB governance, after the contested procedure surrounding the programme decree. Second, it carries a recruitment and retention dimension: teachers speaking of leaving the profession, and unions warning of job losses concentrated among temporary staff, point to consequences that could outlast the current confrontation.

What’s Next

Between 1 and 16 October, the common front will stage a series of regional actions, with an evaluation to follow. The key question is whether the Degryse-Glatigny tandem reopens social consultation — the condition the unions have set for standing down. If it does not, the notice could be extended past the autumn holidays, and the confrontation would carry into the winter. The dispute also unfolds against the FWB budget process and federal budget discussions underway in September 2026, adding a wider political dimension.

For now, Belgian francophone schools face an autumn of continued disruption, with the sector’s unions and its government no closer to agreement than when the school year began.