A headteachers’ leader has warned the government that an unfunded pay rise for teachers will create a crisis, forcing schools to set deficit budgets and risking them becoming insolvent.

Geoff Barton the general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders (ASCL) said any uplift in pay must be paid to all teachers.

And he warned that if this were not fully funded by the government, it would be inevitable that schools would have to set deficit budgets.

ASCL has agreed a policy position of warning the Department for Education that the impact of not fully funding the teacher’s pay award would be “to bring schools to crisis point.”

With the summer holidays now just days away, the DfE has not yet announced what the School Teachers’ Review Body (STRB) has recommended for teachers’ pay from September 2018 or what its response to this is.

The STRB is widely expected to recommend a pay rise for teachers but there is uncertainty about how much of this will be funded by the Treasury.

Pay uplift must be ‘equitable’

Mr Barton said: “The STRB is an independent body. Its recommendations should be followed and any uplift it recommends must be paid to all teachers.

“Otherwise, it’s left to market forces and you will have a situation where, in one town, school A pays the pay rise and school B doesn’t. That would be an invidious situation and would not help teacher recruitment and retention. This should be equitable.

“If schools are not given new funding to meet the pay rise, what follows is that schools will have to set deficit budgets. It will be inevitable.”

Barton said to Tes that he had told Eileen Milner, the chief executive of the Education and Skills Funding Agency (ESFA) that the idea of schools balancing budgets without a fully funded increase in pay was “implausible and impossible.”

ASCL’s policy statement says: “As a fundamental principle, all national pay awards should be fully funded by central government. The impact of not fully funding the pay award will bring schools to crisis point and place our members in an invidious position, making it necessary to set deficit budgets and leading to schools becoming insolvent.

“In order to maintain competitiveness in the labour market, ASCL believes that the annual uplift should apply to all teachers and leaders and that employers should ensure that their pay policies reflect this principle.”

Delay over decision ‘a joke’

It is rumoured that a decision on teachers’ pay may be forthcoming before the start of the summer holidays.

Barton told Tes last night that the situation had become a joke.

Today the DfE would only say that it was considering the STRB report carefully and would respond “in due course.”

Paul Whiteman, the general secretary of the NAHT headteachers’ union voiced the hope that the delay in announcing a decision was because the government was working to secure funding.

He said yesterday:  “It is a concern for school leaders that it has taken so long for the Government to publish the STRB report and its response to it because it creates a problem for school leaders who are trying to come up with their budget for the next academic year.

“We have always said that whatever the pay settlement is it has to be fully funded. We hope that the delay in the announcement means that the government is using the extra time productively.”

A DfE spokeswoman said: “The education secretary has been clear that there can be no great schools without great teachers.

“That is why we have committed to making sure that teaching remains an attractive and fulfilling profession, and are working with the unions to strip away workload that doesn’t add value, improve conditions and offer all teachers high quality professional development.

“We are considering the STRB report carefully and will respond in due course.”