Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if she will make an assessment of trends in (a) recruitment and (b) retention of school support staff in (i) Birmingham and (ii) England in the last five years.

The full-time equivalent (FTE) of support staff has increased each year since the 2019/20 academic year, to 510,400 in 2023/24, and has now passed the previous peak of 2015/16. This is an increase of 4,800 (0.9%) since last year. This increase is mainly due to the addition of 2,400 in other support staff.

Support staff are categorised into posts of teaching assistants, administrative staff, auxiliary staff, technicians and other supporting staff, plus two new posts of school business professional and leadership non-teacher reported for the first time in 2023/24.

School business professionals include roles such as bursar, business manager, finance officer, office manager, premises manager or ICT network manager.

Data relating to the FTE of all support staff can be found here: https://explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk/data-tables/permalink/7b0a17e8-b3ff-403e-687f-08dca70c1109.

Equivalent data relating to Birmingham’s parliamentary constituencies can be found here: https://explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk/data-tables/permalink/0fb9acee-35f2-4607-fac3-08dca70cb6e4.

School support staff play a vital role in children’s education and development. The department values and recognises the professionalism of the entire school workforce and will address recruitment and retention challenges by reinstating the School Support Staff Negotiating Body.

This body will be tasked with establishing a national terms and conditions handbook, training and progression routes, ensuring that schools can recruit and retain the staff needed to deliver high quality, inclusive education.