Teachers in England and Wales in the NEU union are today taking part in their first day of strike action over pay.
The Department for Education has offered a 5 per cent pay rise to most teachers for the current school year, but the NEU is demanding a fully funded above-inflation pay rise.
Below we look at how much teachers in England earn compared with others around the UK and the world.
Teacher strike: did teachers in England get an inflationary pay rise?
The pay rises awarded for 2022-23 vary depending on the experience of the teacher.
The pay increases for teachers outside of London range from 8.9 per cent for early career teachers (ECTs) to reach £28,000 in their first year of teaching, to 5 per cent for teachers at the top of the main scale and on the upper pay scale to reach £38,810 and £43,685 respectively.
But all these figures are below inflation, meaning that in real terms pay has declined. The Consumer Price Index (CPI) measure of inflation sat at 10.1 per cent back at the start of the school year, and in December it was at 10.5 per cent.
The Retail Price Index (RPI) - another measure of inflation - sat at 12.6 per cent in September and 13.4 per cent in December, although this rate is generally higher because it includes mortgage interest payments and is therefore heavily influenced by interest rates.
To put this in context, the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) has said that salaries for more experienced and senior teachers have fallen by 13 per cent in real terms since 2010. Teachers in the middle of the salary scale have experienced cuts of 9-10 per cent since 2010. Starting salaries have fallen by 5 per cent in real terms.
Education secretary Gillian Keegan has said that the “simplistic” percentage figures do not take into account the full financial package that teachers receive.
Speaking this morning, she said that 40 per cent of classroom teachers would also get “progression pay”, meaning that this year “40 per cent would get up to 15.9 per cent, and, of course, that’s on top of a package that includes 23.6 per cent employer contributory pensions”.
Ms Keegan added: “Everybody taking these very simplistic percentage figures [to explain how pay has fallen or risen] forgets the progression pay, which there is with the bands of a lot of the public sector who are on strike at the moment.
“They also get time-based and promotion-based progression within their pay bands.”
How does teacher pay compare across the UK?
In England starting salaries for teachers outside of London sit at £28,000, and in Wales they sit at £28,866.
In Scotland the figure for a probationer teacher is £28,113, although after this year they go on to a salary of £33,729.
In England the top of the upper pay range sits at £43,685, while in Wales the equivalent is £44,450.
In Scotland the top of the teacher pay scale sits at £42,336.
Negotiations over teacher pay in Northern Ireland have been protracted, but proposals covering 2021 to 2023 would result in a new teacher’s salary rising from about £24,000 to £26,000, and the current top of the scale is just over £41,000.
How do the pay changes compare with countries outside of the UK?
According to a study by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), across OECD countries between 2015 and 2021 the statutory salaries of teachers at lower-secondary level with 15 years of experience and the most prevalent qualifications increased by 6 per cent in real terms.
Salary increases were below the OECD average in England over this period, increasing by just 4 per cent, the report says.
The report also says that teacher salaries fell by more than 6 per cent in real terms in England between 2010 and 2020.
And it adds that this means that England was one of only five countries in the study where actual teacher salaries decreased in real terms in at least one level of education.
