Union Learning Representatives - A New Source of Professional Support for Scottish TeachersAlex Alexandrou and John Dwyfor Davies - University of the West of EnglandUnion Learning Representatives (ULRs) are a relatively recent phenomenon and are a new category of lay representation within the workplace in the United Kingdom. They are part of the present New Labour administration's drive to expand and improve lifelong learning and continuous professional development and create the new "learning society". In this case, particularly amongst all parts of the British workforce by working in partnership with the trade union movement. This initiative has been given greater credence by the Employment Act 2002, which grants a number of statutory rights to ULRs.The United Kingdom is unique in the developed world in that it has established by law the right for employees to elect a ULR. Unusually in this case the UK has given a right to employees not given in the rest of the European Community, where in many other respects employees have rights denied those in the UK.ULRs have become significant in the Scottish educational system, particularly in response to the McCrone Report, 1999, which dealt with the future of continuing professional development (CPD) of Scottish teachers. It recommended that every teacher should have a personalized CPD plan agreed once a year and local authorities following consultations with the teaching unions, increase the time made available for CPD by a further five days per year.To this end, the Educational Institute of Scotland (EIS) which represents the overwhelming majority of teachers in Scotland, took up the challenge and with the help of grant money from the Scottish Executive launched a Learning Representatives scheme with the expressed desire that these representatives work to advise, broker and facilitate improved CPD opportunities for their colleagues. The aim of our paper is two-fold. Firstly, to outline the EIS Learning Representatives scheme in some detail and secondly, to see how it operates within schools and local authorities and identify the benefits to teachers who have used the services of these representatives. Our research will be underpinned by the Democratic Evaluation approach to educational research, where the voice of the participant is primary. The data for this paper will be collected using information from questionnaires, one-to-one interviews and consultation groups (using the Nominal Group Technique).Our hope is that the paper stimulates a debate in Europe amongst academics and politicians to the extent that the concept of ULRs is adopted beyond the shores of the UK, as advocated by the international trade union federation - UNI in response to the European Community's publicly stated aim of becoming the most competitive and dynamic knowledge- based economy by 2010.