Inner-city teachers 'should be given golden handcuffs'

Teachers in deprived inner-city schools should be given "golden handcuff" bonuses every five years to stop them quitting for jobs in the suburbs, the head of the teachers' disciplinary body said yesterday.

Carol Adams, the chief executive of the General Teaching Council, demanded a multi-million-pound package to keep the brightest teachers in the worst-performing schools after a national survey showed more than one in three teachers wanted to quit in the next five years. The numbers seeking to go were highest in schools in deprived areas.

The call rekindles the notion of social priority area payments made in the 1980s to teachers in schools with the highest numbers of pupils entitled to free school meals. The payments were described as danger money by union leaders at the time. "To work effectively in such schools requires exceptional motivation, stamina and energy," Ms Adams told the North of England education conference in Warrington, Cheshire. "What the pupils need above all is continuity – and they need the self-esteem that comes with knowing that their school is where teachers want to stay long term." Ms Adams said teachers in the country's most challenging schools should be given loyalty bonuses after five and 10 years, with a term's sabbatical leave, to try to persuade them to stay in their jobs.

"I was talking to a couple of teachers who described how children had told them, 'You're not going to stay here – nobody ever does'. That image is very bad for pupils' self-esteem if they see their school as not a place to stay in.

"Until teaching our neediest children becomes the pinnacle of a professional career, the best-rewarded and most sought-after job, we cannot seriously tackle social injustice or provide equality of opportunity.

"The fact remains that teachers are likely to find it considerably more attractive to work in a successful school with good discipline, well motivated students and greater freedoms," Ms Adams said.

"Reports [from Ofsted, the Government's education standards watchdog] from the last academic year show a close correlation between the weakest schools and the employment of unqualified teachers in specialist subjects. "Temporary teachers also found it harder to manage behaviour and lift expectations. And there is a further problem: having to manage temporary and unqualified teachers can become a severe drain on the remaining experienced staff."

The comments came a day after Mike Tomlinson, a former chief schools inspector, said the gap between the best and worst-performing secondary schools was growing.

Ms Adams' scheme was given a cautious welcome by John Dunford, the general secretary of the Secondary Heads Association, who said: "We need to think seriously about how to attract the best teachers into schools in difficult circumstances." He added: "They want smaller classes, study leave and more time off for professional development." David Miliband, the minister for School Standards, said the Government would look at new ideas for retaining teachers.

Yesterday's poll, by Mori for the teaching council, showed 35 per cent of teachers thought they would quitwithin the next five years. In addition to a higher percentage of disaffection among inner-city teachers, black and Asian teachers were more likely to resign, blaming a lack of respect from pupils and male colleagues.

¿ Britain's biggest teaching union has refused to sign an agreement with the Government on modernising the profession unless ministers scrap plans to allow classroom assistants to take over lessons.

The Government wants all teachers unions to agree in principle to the deal by next week. However, Doug McAvoy, general secretary of the National Union of Teachers, said the union wanted agreement on minimum staffing levels of qualified teachers in every school to make sure too many unqualified assistants did not come on to the staff.