Use of unqualified teachers on the rise

According to Tristram Hunt more than 400,000 students are being taught by unqualified staff. Hunt claims there are 17, 100 unqualified teacher in state funded schools - a rise of 16% in the last year alone. The actual figure could be much higher than this with teaching assistants increasingly being given 'intervention groups' which are really whole classes, and the use of the role of 'learning coach' being used in a similar way to mask unqualified teacher employment.

Hunt promises that Labour will reverse the rules which allow academies and free-schools to use unqualified staff. That is to be welcomed but it does not go far enough. There is a reason schools are using unqualified staff - they can get away with paying them less. As school budgets get squeezed schools will increasingly use unqualified staff or use the new pay policies to pay qualified staff less. Labour should commit to increase school funding so not only can we avoid using unqualified staff but we can reduce class sizes, give teachers more PPA time and therefore give students a better education.

Labour should also commit to reverse academies and free schools. Bringing all schools back into state ownership and local authority control, with a national contract and negotiated pay scale for teachers.

The NUT should organise unqualified teachers, and work towards one union for all school workers, to protect their rights at work and level up pay to the level of qualified staff rather than setting up a divide in the workforce where employers can play us against each other.