Teachers to benefit from multi-year pay deal

• School teachers to see pay boosted over the next two years, as part of 17% increase since the general election

• Pay award backed by significant additional investment so schools and colleges can continue to offer pupils and young people an excellent education

• Curb on academy senior pay to ensure public money reaches classrooms, not executive pay packets

School teachers and leaders will see their pay increase by 6.5% over the next two years, after the Education Secretary accepted the School Teachers Review Body's pay recommendations in full today (1 July).

Teachers will receive an increase of 3.5% from September 2026, followed by 3% from September 2027, delivering a cumulative 17% rise since the general election.

In further evidence of this government's continued investment in public services, additional funding of £1.8bn will be provided to schools over two years, supporting pay rises for hard working teachers and support staff.

Schools, like the rest of the public sector, will need to continue to play their part and will be expected to find the first 1% of each pay award through continued efforts to maximise value from their budgets.

An additional £485m will be provided to colleges and other further education providers over two years so they can continue to recruit and retain more excellent teachers and deliver high quality vocational, academic and technical courses.

To ensure taxpayers' money is being invested where it is needed most, the government will also put curbs on academy trust executive pay.

From September, trusts will need to seek government approval before advertising roles over £174,000, bringing the sector in line with other public sector workforces including the NHS and colleges. Annual increases for executives will also be brought in line with the wider school workforce, meaning executives will not be able to receive pay rises higher than those set for classroom teachers.

Education Secretary Bridget Philipson said:

Our brilliant school and college teachers go above and beyond every day, and I'm determined that dedication is not just recognised, but rewarded.

This multi-year deal, backed by significant additional investment, shows the immense value we place in our teachers, while giving schools and colleges certainty over pay and their budgets.

It's also right that classroom teachers are not seeing executive pay rise faster than their own or set at excessive levels in the first place so tighter controls will mean unjustifiable exec salaries become a thing of the past, helping level the playing field for school staff and drive every pound towards classrooms.

The announcement today means school teachers will see an increase in their pay of 17% since this government took power equating to almost £7,900 over four years with the average school teacher salary rising to over £52,800 from September 2026 and over £54,400 from September 2027.

It builds on significantly improved recruitment and retention figures, with over 4,500 more teachers in secondary schools, special schools and colleges since 2024 reaching over 70% of the government's commitment to recruit 6,500 new teachers with three years to go.

And beyond those figures, fewer schoolteachers are leaving the profession and there has been a 13% rise in the number of people choosing to train to teach this year a post-pandemic record  signalling a strong pipeline for the future.

The government's Maximising Value for Pupils programme will play a vital role in supporting schools to get the best value from their budgets, by offering better deals on areas like energy, recruitment, and banking. Schools across the country are already reaping the rewards, including Bishop Hogarth Catholic Education Trust which increased its annual interest income from £16,000 to over £1.1 million by reviewing its banking arrangements.

The government's work to tackle child poverty, in particular lifting the two-child benefit limit, is also widely recognised as supporting teachers and easing pressure on school finances, with schools increasingly going above and beyond to support young people in their day-to-day lives over the past decade. Over 1.5m children in Great Britain will benefit from the removal of the two-child limit, and 450,000 children will be lifted out of poverty.

Note to Editors

• The pay figure for the parliament to date is calculated on a compounded basis, reflecting how pay increases are applied in practice. For the two year pay award of this announcement, the award has been rounded to 6.5% for simplicity but with compounding will be 6.6%.
• This means schoolteachers will have seen a 17% increase in pay since this Government took office, delivering a real terms increase (based on Bank of England CPI forecasts).
• There will also be a 5% uplift to the bottom of the unqualified teacher pay range (Rest of England), supporting employment-based routes into teaching, including apprenticeships.
• Schools will receive additional funding of £700m for the first year of the pay award in financial year 26-27, rising to £1.1bn in financial year 27-28.
• Changes to the School Teachers' Pay and Conditions Document have also been announced today. This includes:

• enabling maintained schools to offer modest non-consolidated recognition payments to staff;
• increasing flexibility on INSET days so that schools can structure training in the way which works best for staff and pupils; and
• clarifying the protections for leaders' working time, including right to uninterrupted breaks and expectations that weekends and, public holiday should ordinarily be preserved as non-working time for leaders.

• From 1 September 2026 departmental approval must be sought in advance of academy trusts advertising for new appointments where proposed executive remuneration exceeds £174,000 (pro-rated for part-time staff), or where performance-related pay goes above £25,000;
• We are also introducing the requirement that existing executive remuneration must not increase at a faster rate than that of the academy trust's teachers, unless there is a clear justification for it to do so. This approach strengthens oversight of all executive remuneration, ensuring decisions about high levels of pay are appropriately scrutinised.
• Most school support staff are currently employed on National Joint Council (NJC) for local government services pay and conditions. The Government does not currently have a role in setting school support staff pay and conditions. NJC employees have been offered a pay increase of 3.3% from 1 April 2026, which is subject to agreement by the recognised NJC unions.
• The 27-28 pay award for school support staff has not been determined yet and we expect this to be negotiated between employer and employee representatives once the School Support Staff Negotiating Body (SSSNB) has been established.  
• Following their incorporation under the 1992 Further and Higher Education Act, FE colleges, rather than government, are responsible for setting and negotiating pay. 
• FE providers will receive aroud £120 million of additional funding in financial year 2026-27, rising to around £365 million in 2027-28. Taken together with the additional funding for post-16 provision in school and academies which comes from within the overall schools funding envelope, around £170 million will be available for post-16 funding in financial year 2026-27, rising to around £535 million in 2027-28. We continue to expect colleges and other FE providers to maximise value from their budgets to drive forward high-quality delivery.