MINISTERS have been urged to negotiate with councils to prevent any further escalation of a row over teacher numbers.
Opposition politicians spoke out after a stand-off between the Scottish Government and council umbrella body Cosla.
Cosla last week took the first step towards unprecedented legal action against the Government after minister tried to bypass the body.
Officials took legal advice after individual councils were told by ministers to maintain teacher numbers or face losing millions of pounds of funding.
Liam McArthur, education spokesman for the Scottish Liberal Democrats, said: "I sincerely hope the Scottish Government and Cosla get back round the table and sort this out.
"It benefits no one, not least pupils and parents, for this disagreement to continue to play out and it is time for ministers to get back round the table with council leaders and reach agreement."
Liz Smith, Scottish Conservative young people spokeswoman, said power over recruitment of staff should be given to headteachers.
She added: "This unholy row is yet more proof that the current arrangement of school funding is not delivering for our schools.
"Parents will be astonished to learn that instead of there being a focus on solving the problem of declining teacher numbers there is now a turf war about whose fault it is.
"It is abundantly clear that local government funding structures are creaking right across the board and that there is far too much red tape getting in the way of teacher recruitment."
On Monday Cosla chief executive Rory Mair said lawyers had been consulted over the issue, but stressed that any potential legal action was "down the road from our point of view".
He said: "We've now taken legal advice which suggests the government have a case to answer about the legality of their behaviour over the teacher number issue and the imposition of this deal."
A Scottish Government spokesman said it was firmly committed to maintaining both teacher numbers and the pupil-teacher ratio.
He said: "Having not only the highest quality, but also the right number of teachers in our schools to support our pupils is a policy we would hope local authorities would support."
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