The UK public spending regulator warned that the government's main guarantees of appointing 6,500 additional teachers in England by the end of this parliament would be difficult to achieve and would likely meet demand.

Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson promised to recruit thousands of additional teachers in state schools, which is funding by increasing VAT to private school fees, one of the cornerstones of government education policy.

However, a report released by the National Audit Office (NAO) on Wednesday warned that the number of students in secondary schools is expected to increase Labor's recruitment ambitions, leaving teacher positions unfilled.

The report said that due to the long-term recruitment and retention crisis, further education (FE) colleges will require up to 12,400 teachers by 2028-29, twice the government’s overall guarantee.

Meanwhile, the number of new qualification teachers established in state middle schools in 2023-24 fell to 8,700, the lowest since 2010-11. The Ministry of Education (DFE) has missed all coaching goals in the past 10 years except for one.

As the number of middle school students may peak in 2028, further pressure is put on the system, and NAO calls on the government to release a delivery plan outlining how it intends to recruit another 6,500 teachers over the time frame. It also urged the Minister to “assess the extent to which further educational workforce models are appropriate for purpose”.

"DFE evaluates the government's commitment to 6,500 teachers will be very challenging," said Geoffrey Clifton-Brown, chairman of the Public Accounts Committee. "Even if it is met, it's not clear that this will be enough to address the national teacher shortage for more and more students.

“A new inter-departmental approach is needed to recruit and retain sufficient quality teachers. Otherwise, the workforce challenge will continue to pose a real threat to the education and life prospects of young people.”

"Despite the government's commitment, secondary schools and further education colleges are facing challenges in ensuring adequate teachers are supporting the growing number of students," said Gareth Davies, head of NAO.

Jack Worth, head of the school workforce at the National Foundation for Educational Research, said the report sent a clear message to the government that it would miss its commitment to recruit 6,500 teachers if no action is taken now.

He added: “The unfilled vacancy levels are the highest since the founding record in 2010, and compensation is the contribution to teachers leaving the profession by coping with the pressure of student behavior and reported workload pressure.”

“There is an urgent need for appropriate salary increases, as well as non-financial measures such as reducing workload and flexible work to improve recruitment and retention.” The Ministry of Finance has said that any salary increase must come from existing budgets.

In response to the NAO report, Philipson reiterated the government's commitment to recruiting 6,500 teachers. “We’ve seen green shoots, and there are 2,000 middle school teachers training this year and have increased the number of people who will start training on short stemming (science, technology, engineering and math) topics, but there’s a lot to be done.

“After last year’s 5.5% compensation reward, investing hundreds of millions of pounds to help us turn the trend, I am determined to restore teaching to an attractive, prestigious career.”

Meanwhile, separate studies of teacher recruitment claim that men “face discrimination” when applying for roles in English school workforce, especially at entry-level jobs such as teaching assistant roles.

The Warwick Business School study asked 600 teachers to evaluate virtual resumes and found that the average rating for men was 1.2 percentage points lower than that for women, while the teacher assistant role application was less than 1.8 percentage points.

“There is increasing concern about the lack of male teachers, especially as role models for boys,” said Dr. Joshua Fullard, assistant professor at the school. “But our research shows that despite this concern, people still face bias in the recruitment process, especially in lower positions.”

"This is a useful finding that shows a small bias against male applicants. However, it appears to be conducted as a simulation and therefore may not be suitable for the real application process," said Professor Stephen Gorard, director of the Center for Educational Evidence at Durham University, who was not involved in the study.