Recruits ease shortage of teachers

The Government claimed credit today for beginning to turn round the chronic teacher shortage after figures showed the biggest increase in staff numbers for 20 years.

But the boost still left nearly 4,500 official teacher vacancies across the country - more than 1,300 in London - figures which teaching unions will claim underestimate the true picture by only counting posts vacant for more than a term.

Today's figures show a 2.3 per cent increase in the number of teachers in schools in England in the year to January, up 9,400 to 419,600, the single biggest annual increase in more than 20 years.

Heads in the capital, however, say their experience of teacher shortages is as bad as last year, the worst on record, when the official vacancy rate nationwide nearly doubled on the previous year.

Only last week, teacher shortages forced Bognor Regis Community College in West Sussex on to a temporary four-day week, affecting hundreds of pupils.

In London, the increase was 0.6 per cent to 62,100 full-time staff.

Ministers say the increases show the range of incentives for graduates to enter teaching - including bursaries and training salaries of up to £10,000 in shortage subjects - is paying off. They acknowledge that far more remains to be done, and that the biggest challenge is to keep new teachers in the profession. Four out of 10 newly-qualified teachers leave within three years.

A report by the School Teachers Review Body on measures to reduce workload, due out early next month, will be crucial, along with Education Secretary Estelle Morris's success in winning cash from Chancellor Gordon Brown to fund its recommendations.

Ms Morris said: "We are moving in the right direction but I know we have more to do."