College teacher shortages put government missions at risk, say MPs

An influential committee of MPs has demanded six-monthly updates on college teacher recruitment and retention amid warnings shortages put the government’s missions at risk.

Parliament’s public accounts committee (PAC) also slammed the government for lacking a “coherent plan” to boost recruitment and failing to clearly explain how its 6,500 teacher target was calculated. 

The findings have been laid out in a report today, which follows a National Audit Office study into teacher supply earlier this year.

Committee member Sarah Olney said: “The shortfalls laid out in our report show how urgent it is that DfE lays out the detail behind its pledge for 6,500 more teachers.

“If the recommendations in our report are followed, the government will have an explicit answer, based on its own analysis and evidence, on whether it is time to offer teachers more flexibility, and/or to pay them more.”

Here’s what you need to know…  

Set out 6.5k teacher details and milestones

The report noted officials could not give the committee a “clear explanation” of how the government’s 6,500-teacher pledge was calculated or how it will fill workforce gaps. Forecasts suggest up to 12,400 more teachers will be needed in colleges alone by 2028.

“There remains no information on the baseline against which the pledge will be measured, how it will be split across schools and colleges, or the milestones… to be met for the department to be on track to deliver by the end of this Parliament,” it added.

The committee said the department should set out this information and outline how “it will stay focused on teacher retention alongside recruitment”.

Pepe Di’Iasio, of the Association of School and College Leaders, said the pledge “does not seem anything like enough to address future need and we would urge ministers to address actual teacher shortages rather than fixate on a figure which is largely meaningless”.

The government told FE Week last week the pledge would be based on improving the net number of teachers, using the 2023-24 academic year as a baseline. This means not all teachers will be ‘new’, as promised, and they will not be focused on shortage subjects either.

College vacancies threaten Labour’s vision

PAC noted that further education teacher shortages impact “the type and extent of skills developed” by colleges. This “puts the achievement of the government’s missions for opportunity and growth at risk”.

Given this “urgent need”, the DfE has been told to “update the committee on its full recruitment and retention plans for the further education sector as soon as possible”.

Further updates should then be made “every six months until summer 2028 on its progress”.

An estimated 1,600 new teachers will be needed by 2027-28 in secondary schools, whereas between 8,400 and 12,400 will be needed in further education by 2028-29 to meet skills needs and rising student numbers.

‘No coherent plan’

DfE has been told it “lacks a coherent plan, suitable targets, and sufficient evidence” showing its funding is focused “on what works best” to boost teacher numbers.

While it has evaluated “some” of its school recruitment and retention initiatives, it has not undertaken a “full” review, despite “a recommendation by a previous public accounts committee in 2016”.

Evaluations of DfE’s further education initiatives were even “less mature”.

Understanding competition with schools

Ministers have been urged to develop a “whole system strategy”, based on a “fuller evidence base”, which establishes “the preferred balance between recruitment and retention initiatives”.

Higher salaries in schools and industry are flagged as key reason why high numbers of FE teachers quit the profession. The PAC took aim at the DfE’s understanding of the competition for teachers between colleges and schools in particular. 

It found that the department’s only recruitment strategy since 2019 had been for schools, and that teams of schools and FE officials until recently “worked in silos”.

The report said: “The department has now started to think in a more joined-up way, to help better understand what works and the trade-offs of its decisions”. 

Value for money of pay rises

The committee recommended that officials evaluate “value-for-money of pay against other recruitment and retention initiatives, to make an explicit decision on whether it needs to do more to ensure teachers are paid the right amount”. This would inform decisions on “whether it needs to do more to ensure teachers are paid the right amount”.

The report added that the benefits associated with being on the teachers’ pensions scheme are a “hugely valuable yet easily under-sold perk of the job”.

David Hughes, chief executive of the Association of Colleges, dismissed the recommendation. 

“My response is that we have to face up to the reality that pay is the biggest barrier to recruitment and retention in FE. Until that is addressed, colleges will struggle to recruit the right staff and the government’s ambitions for skills will be thwarted,” he said.