Watch my question about how schools are supposed to fund an increase to teachers' pay

The government has accepted in full independent pay recommendations for teachers’ pay for 2025/26, implementing a pay award for school teachers and leaders of 4% from September.

However this pay award is not fully funded and schools will be expected to find approximately the first 1% of pay awards.

Caroline Voaden MP asking the Schools Minister where schools are meant to find the extra money to fund an increase to teacher payWhile schools will welcome a higher pay award than expected, and funding of the first 2.8%, it will still be a challenge for them to find the remaining 1%.

The Education Minister Bridget Phillipson says they can do this “through improved productivity and smarter spending to make every pound count. There will be those who say this cannot be done, but I believe schools have a responsibility, like the rest of the public sector, to ensure that their funding is spent as efficiently as possible.”

I am furious that any Education Minister thinks schools have not done everything they possibly can already to spend the money they have ‘as efficiently as possible’.

One school in South Devon told me that finding 1% on teachers’ pay will cost it an extra £95,000 a year. Primary schools are consolidating classes, support staff are being laid off, small and rural schools are finding it particularly tough as they receive less money because of lower pupil numbers.

The National Association of Headteachers Devon Branch recently told me ‘we are on our knees. There is nothing left to cut’.

I asked the Schools Minister Catherine McKinnell this morning where schools are meant to find this extra money. She talked about the Department for Education supporting schools to save money on things they are buying, on maintenance and management, on energy costs and banking, and by looking at what other schools are doing well.

When we hear about teachers using their own money to buy resources for their classrooms it is nothing short of insulting that the DofE think they can find the huge sums of money required to meet this pay award by cutting back – there is, literally, no fat left on the bone.

If the government can help them find this money by making savings on energy bills etc then that’s great. I will be raising it on behalf of my local schools.