Rob Marris
Main Page: Rob Marris (Labour - Wolverhampton South West)Department Debates - View all Rob Marris's debates with the Department for Education
(8 years, 11 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Mr Gibb
We continue to offer bursaries for graduates coming into teaching design and technology. We have also revised the curriculum, which we believe has made it a more attractive and rigorous qualification. The number of students taking it at GCSE and A-level has been falling over a number of years, and to tackle that we have improved the qualifications in that subject. That should follow through into more people becoming graduates in those subjects and moving into teaching.
Rob Marris (Wolverhampton South West) (Lab)
Retention in teaching is a far bigger problem than recruitment. We are haemorrhaging teachers. That is caused largely by the adverse workload that teachers are placed under. What specific steps are the Government taking to lessen teacher workloads in England?
Mr Gibb
The doom-mongering notion that the hon. Gentleman is citing is wrong. Eighty-seven per cent. of teachers who qualified in 2013 were still teaching a year later, and 72% of those who qualified in 2009 are still teaching five years later. He should stop talking down what is a very popular profession in this country. We are tackling the excessive workload that teachers inherited from the previous Labour Government. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State introduced the workload challenge, and we have three working groups specifically tasked with tackling the issues that were identified in it.