Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how much the Government has spent on contracts with temporary teaching agencies for staff at schools in Huntingdon constituency since 5 July 2024.

Supply teachers make an important contribution to the smooth running of schools across the country by filling posts on a temporary basis and covering teacher absences.

Schools and local authorities are responsible for the recruitment of their supply teachers and there are currently various approaches to providing supply teachers, including using agencies. Therefore, the department does not hold contracts with temporary agencies for staff at schools and does not hold the data requested.

The department collects financial data from schools across England through the Consistent Financial Reporting framework for local authority maintained schools, and through the Academy Accounts Return for academies and multi-academy trusts. The Financial Benchmarking and Insights Tool reports on school and academy spend on supply teaching, including expenditure on agency supply teaching staff. This includes “costs paid to an agency for teaching staff that have been brought in to cover teacher absence”. The Tool can be accessed here: https://financial-benchmarking-and-insights-tool.education.gov.uk/data-sources.