The government is being urged to take action against schools trying to encourage teachers to opt out of the Teachers’ Pension Scheme (TPS).

At the TUC Congress in Brighton, the NASUWT teaching union said thousands of teachers were being given the option of leaving the scheme in return for higher salaries.

There have also been reports of private schools trying to encourage teachers to leave the scheme.

The NASUWT’s call comes after the biggest multi-academy trust, United Learning, revealed its plan to introduce an alternative pension scheme, which would offer teachers the chance to earn more take-home pay.

Sir Jon Coles, chief executive of United Learning, previously defended the plan to offer an alternative pension scheme, saying it could “out compete” other employers and would bring more teachers into the profession.

Protest over alternative teacher pension

Wayne Broom, senior vice-president of the NAWUST, told the TUC Congress: “The significance of the United Learning proposals is that this is the largest multi-academy trust in England and is, as such, directly maintained and funded by the government as a large public sector employer.

“The Teachers’ Pension Scheme is mandatory for multi-academy trusts as a public body.

“This is the first time we have seen a significant public body, which is an employer of teachers, propose to incentivise opt-outs from that scheme.

“It is vital that both the government and the pensions regulator take action against public sector employers which offer higher salaries to employees in return for opting out of public sector schemes.”

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Dr Patrick Roach, the union’s general secretary, added: “Any attempt to seek to persuade or induce teachers to opt out of the TPS will be resisted strongly.

“United Learning’s actions are not acceptable, and we will not hesitate to do whatever it takes to protect our members.”

United Learning has used its reserves to fund a higher pay rise for teachers this year than the 6.5 per cent awarded by the government. It said it was doing this because of the cost-of-living pressures faced by staff.

A spokesperson for United Learning said: “Before the summer we agreed with the general secretaries of all the unions that our proposals would be discussed this term through our normal consultative forum.”

They added that it was “disappointing to see one of those unions now trying to create a false narrative about those proposals”.

A Department for Education spokesperson said: “Teachers have access to a generous pension scheme, which has employer contributions of 28.6 per cent and member contributions averaging 9.6 per cent. This compares favourably with other sectors and is valued by the profession.”