Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment her Department has made of the potential impact of the real terms value of pay awards through the School Teachers Pay Review Body process on teachers in each year since 2010.

Pay for teachers and leaders in maintained schools is set through an annual statutory process with independent recommendations made by the School Teachers’ Review Body (STRB) based on a range of evidence, including the real terms value of teacher pay.

While in power, this government has accepted their recommendations in full.

This year’s pay award of 4% exceeds forecasts for inflation and provides a competitive salary for both new and existing teachers. Based on forecasts for inflation across the 2025/26 academic year, this is a real-terms increase of around 1.5%.

The department wants teaching to be an attractive and expert profession, to ensure that our children have the expert teachers they need to achieve and thrive and tackle recruitment and retention issues. That is also why we are committed to delivering the manifesto pledge to recruit 6,500 teachers across secondary and special schools, and in our colleges, over the course of this Parliament and there are already signs that our Plan for Change is working.

The workforce has grown by 2,346 full-time equivalent between 2023/24 and 2024/25, in secondary and special schools over the last year. Additionally, our future school teacher pipeline is growing. As of May 2025, there are 11% more trainees who have accepted offers to train as secondary subjects, including in priority subjects such as physics, where we have seen a 43% increase in acceptances compared to last year.