Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if he will provide the number of teachers by subject taught that left the profession in academic years (a) 2019-20, (b) 2020-21, (c) 2021-22 and (d) 2022-23 to date in England.

Recent data shows that there are now over 468,000 full time equivalent (FTE) teachers in state funded schools in England, which is an increase of 27,000 (6%) since 2010. This makes the highest number of FTE teachers since the School Workforce Census began in 2010.

Information on the school workforce in England, including the number and characteristics (age, gender, ethnicity, working pattern and post) of teachers joining and leaving service nationally, is published in the ‘School Workforce in England’ statistical publication, available at: https://explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk/find-statistics/school-workforce-in-england. This information by gender is available at: https://explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk/data-tables/permalink/7b82526d-9d49-4c9b-c47f-08db81eb944a.

Figures for 2022/23 leavers are not available yet as they will be identified by their absence from the November 2023 census.

The requested figures for leavers by subject taught are not available.

Leavers are defined as qualified teachers leaving the state funded sector in England, for example due to a change of career or joining other UK education sectors, and those leaving on career breaks, such as maternity leave or secondments outside of the school sector. Some of these teachers may rejoin a state funded school in England at a later date.

The Department collects information on teacher absence from state funded schools via the School Workforce Census. The number of working days lost due to absence are collected for sickness absence and pregnancy related absences only. This information is published in the ‘School Workforce in England’ statistical publication here: https://explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk/data-tables/permalink/f5ba72da-be42-4d81-d365-08db81e98ab0. Further granularity, such as the type of sickness absence, is not centrally collected.