To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment he has made of the effect of the pay gap between teachers working in schools and further education colleges on the (a) recruitment and (b) retention of staff working in further education colleges; and if he will make a statement.

​It is essential that the further education (FE) sector is able to recruit and retain excellent teachers if we are to achieve a world-class technical education system in England. Due to the independent nature of the FE sector, and government’s historical relationship with it, we do not have detailed data on FE teacher pay, or on the wider FE workforce.

We are undertaking work to understand the situation better, including the specific challenges and opportunities in relation to teacher recruitment and retention in the sector. This includes our recent College Staff Survey, which is helping us develop a better insight into the state of the teaching profession in FE and shows that more than half of all teachers have worked in the sector for ten years or more.

We want to support the recruitment and development of FE teachers. This year we have launched our £5 million Taking Teaching Further programme to help attract talented and inspiring people with industry expertise to teach in FE. We have also announced our £8 million new bespoke professional development offer, T level Professional Development, to help existing teachers and leaders successfully deliver T levels.

​Further, we have recently commissioned research on identifying FE teacher comparators, and on incentive programmes for the recruitment and retention on FE teachers, to better inform our thinking. The reports, and the results of the College Staff Survey, are available at GOV.UK.