Select committee: Public Accounts Committee
Conclusion 26
38th Report - Increasing teacher numbers: Secondary and further education
Published 9 Jul 2025
Addressed to HM Treasury
Public Accounts Committee Increasing teacher numbers: Secondary and further education All items in this report Report on parliament.uk ↗ Inquiry on parliament.uk ↗
Conclusion (the committee's words)
Those schools with higher proportions of disadvantaged pupils tend to have higher turnover rates and less experienced teachers.77 This impacts the government’s mission of breaking down the barriers to opportunity and means disadvantaged children are at risk of being locked out from particular careers.78 In 2023–24, 34% of teachers in the most disadvantaged schools had up to five years’ experience (20% in the least disadvantaged schools).79 In the most disadvantaged areas, 31% of schools do not offer Computer Science A-level, compared to 11% of schools in the least disadvantaged areas, due to a lack of trained teachers. For Physics A-level, this is 9% compared to 1%.80 We asked the Department when we could expect there to be less variation between schools in the most and least disadvantaged areas, but it did not commit to a timeframe. Instead, it noted that its retention initiatives providing financial incentives were targeting schools and colleges with the highest proportion of disadvantaged students.81
From: Public Accounts Committee, 38th Report - Increasing teacher numbers: Secondary and further education (HC 825), 9 July 2025
Government response
Latest Treasury Minutes progress report to the Committee of Public Accounts on the Thirty-eighth Report of Session 2024-26
The government responded to the whole report on 4 June 2026 (deadline 9 September 2025).
Treasury minutes: Government response to the Committee of Public Accounts on the Thirty-eighth report from Session 2024-26
Published 15 October 2025.
Summary written by Accountability Index from the government's response. It is not the government's own words.The government states that it agrees with each of the Committee's recommendations on increasing secondary and further education teacher numbers, and gives target implementation dates between November 2025 and December 2026.
- On the pledge of 6,500 additional teachers, the department "will set out more detail" in a published delivery plan covering the definition of the pledge, tracking of progress, progress to date and the levers it will use, including recruitment and retention.
- On a whole-system strategy, it points to upcoming publications (the Schools White Paper, the 6,500 delivery plan and the post-16 education and skills strategy) and says it is "embedding value for money analysis" into major initiatives.
- On further education, it commits to update the Committee "every 6 months" on progress in recruiting and retaining FE teachers, with a first step being the 6,500 delivery plan.
- On behaviour hubs, it says "further rollout and funding are subject to spending review outcomes and evaluation findings".