Labour snubs colleges in public sector pay awards

The Advanced British Standard has also been scrapped

The Advanced British Standard has also been scrapped

The recommendation to uplift school teacher pay by 5.5 per cent, accepted by the government today, will not apply to colleges.

Chancellor Rachel Reeves today announced that the government has accepted in full the School Teachers’ Review Body’s (STRB) recommendation of a 5.5 per cent pay rise for teachers.

The announcement was part of a package of cost-cutting measures to save £3 billion from government budgets after the new Labour government found a “£22 billion hole in the public finances”.

The pay rise will hand out £1.2billion in additional funding to schools, starting from September 1, and is equivalent to an increase of over £2,500 for the average teacher.

But the Department for Education has said the recommendation will not be extended to college teachers.

“It is disappointing that funding was not found to allow colleges to match that award,” said Association of Colleges chief executive David Hughes. “The result is a no-change position for college finances and pay in the short-term.”

‘We had come to expect such neglect from the Tories’

The University and College Union (UCU) said Labour’s decision not to match the pay award for schools was “at odds” with their mission for government.

Jo Grady, general secretary of UCU, said: “‘Failing to invest in further education is simply not good enough.

“Ultimately, this decision is at odds with Labour’s core missions for government. We had come to expect such neglect from the Tories but we expect more from a Labour government which aims to spread opportunities for working class people and kickstart a decade of national renewal.”

The government’s response to the STRB review was expected in May, but Reeves accused the former education secretary Gillian Keegan of having the pay review recommendations “sitting on her desk”.

The AoC said it deferred its recommendation to colleges until DfE confirmed its decision on schools.

Hughes said today’s announcement makes colleges’ positions more “difficult” as FE funding rates are not high enough to match the offer for schools.

“The next meeting between FE employers and unions is in September and that looks likely to be the start of a set of difficult negotiations – with a significant gap between the pay awards colleges want to be able to offer, and the funding available,” he said.

The £1.2 billion funding will provide £63 million to schools delivering post-16 provision.

ABS ditched

The chancellor also scrapped the former government’s proposal to replace T Levels with the Advanced British Standard, a new qualification estimated to cost £200 million next year.

She slammed former prime minister Rishi Sunak’s introduction of the Advanced British Standard at the conservative party conference last year for not putting “aside a single penny to pay for it”.

“If we cannot afford it, we cannot do it,” she told MPs.

DfE said a cumulative spending commitment of £3 billion by 2028/29 will be avoided as a result of cancelling the ABS.

The department added that the funding for retention payments for teachers and for GCSE maths and English resits, initially announced as part of the ABS, will be unaffected.

The next budget will take place on October 30, during which the chancellor will lay out final budget plans for this year and set the 2025/26 budget, concluding the multi-year Spending Review in spring 2025.

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4 Comments

  1. How can a government be so committed to skills but so against paying the engine room of skills delivery – this is a spectacular own goal for a new Labour government making inroads in so many other elements of the public. The skills agenda will not be met without investment n the wider FE sector.

  2. Zoe Lewis

    Many describe this as a stand still position but in reality it will cause more damage to our skills sector. How can colleges compete – when another part of the sector is valued more by government and Treasury. Schools and colleges both have recruitment and retention challenges but colleges also have increasing demographics so we need more teachers each year for a number of years. This sort of action speaks volumes about priorities going forward. Such a sad announcement for UK plc.

  3. Amy Ealing

    But what about the increase in 16 to 19 rates given next year that was supposed to be for teachers’ pay in FE, the levelling-up premium payments that colleges got over other providers and the “down payments” to college for ABS which will now not even happen, let’s not forget all these things. But critically Where are the AoC in this mess? The AoC, as reported in this article “deferred its recommendation” to colleges until DfE confirmed its decision on schools, which seemed like a complete cop-out at the time. I suspect yet more colleges will vote with their feet, especially with the huge hike in fees they now pay. I seriously sense change is coming.