Teachers' pay needs to increase by ‘significantly more than one per cent’

If current recruitment and retention trends continue, teachers' pay will need to increase ‘significantly more than one per cent’ to ensure an adequate supply of good teachers, according to the School Teachers' Review Body.

The claim was made in the Body’s 26th annual report, which analysed the government’s proposed plans for teachers' salaries.

In the report, the School Teachers' Review Body said that it would accept the proposed one per cent uplift to the minima and maxima of all classroom teacher pay ranges and leadership pay ranges in the national pay framework. However, it only accepts this on the basis that no extra funding would be made available and so if schools were to offer higher pay rises this would need to come out of existing school budgets.

The Body cautioned that many schools are not yet confident enough to use pay flexibilities to develop targeted pay responses and so advise that a generic pay policy would be the best option.

Looking towards the future, the report claims that the one per cent uplift will not be enough if trends continue and argued that there is a case for an uplift higher than one per cent to strengthen the competitive position of the teaching profession at a time of growing demand for graduates.

The School Teachers' Review Body has advised the DfE to prepare for this eventuality. If the current funding does not change, this will likely require school leaders and governing bodies to become more confident in both managing their workforce and in setting pay policies that enable performance based awards and targeted salaries to retain high quality staff.