Teachers’ pay rises will have to come from school budgets, Education Secretary suggests

TEACHER pay rises next year will have to come from school budgets and will not be covered by government funding, the Education Secretary has signalled.

In a letter to the School Teachers’ Review Body, which advises on teacher pay, Gillian Keegan said it should recognise the “impact pay rises will have on schools’ overall budgets”.

Teachers’ unions have reacted with anger over the language used in the letter, after warning that schools are already struggling to cover 5 per cent pay rises for experienced teachers and 9 per cent increases for new teachers this year from school budgets.

Geoff Barton, general secretary of the

Association of School and College Leaders, said Mrs Keegan’s letter “strongly suggests that the Government has no intention of providing any additional funding to enable schools to pay the award to their staff – just as it has failed to provide this vital funding for this year’s pay award”.

Britain’s biggest teaching unions are balloting for strike action over this year’s 5 per cent pay rises for most teachers. Kevin Courtney, joint general secretary of the National Education Union, said: “Teachers need a fully funded, above-inflation pay increase to restore the pay lost in real terms, but the Government has shown that it has no intention of repairing the damage to teacher pay.”

In the letter to the chairman of the review body, Mrs Keegan wrote: “Pay awards must strike a careful balance, recognising the vital importance of teachers and other public sector workers, whilst delivering value for the taxpayer, considering private sector pay levels, not increasing the country’s debt further, and being careful not to drive prices even higher in the future.”

She said in “the current economic context”, it is “particularly important that you have regard to the Government’s inflation target when forming recommendations”. The target is currently 2 per cent. UK inflation reached a 41-year high of 11.1 per cent yesterday.

The Government has committed to increasing teacher starting salaries to £30,000, from £28,000 this year, to address a recruitment crisis.