HC Deb 30 March 1961 vol 637 cc1537-59

12.14 p.m.

Mr. William Hannan (Glasgow, Maryhill)

I should like to begin introducing this topic of the dilution of the teaching profession in Scotland by expressing to you, Mr. Speaker, our appreciation of the opportunity to develop this theme at some length, although it is now somewhat attenuated as a result of the questions which have gone before, about which, however, I make no complaint.

Those who have read the Scottish Press recently are left in no doubt that the Secretary of State for Scotland is faced with a first-class problem and that a crisis is looming in the schools. This is nothing new. It has been pending for a long time—indeed, for some years—as I shall try to show. We all regret the absence of my hon. Friend the Member for Lanarkshire, North (Miss Herbison), who is indisposed, who would have been very pleased to be here and who raised this subject in the debate on the Queen's Speech as far back as November of last year.

We cannot ignore the uprising of temper among the teachers, both men and women, who normally are looked upon as being genteel and quiet, but who are anxious about the quality of education in Scotland. I want to make it clear for myself that I am interested in the conditions of pay and service and the qualifications of teachers only in so far as they are a vital part of the system of education. It is the quality of education about which I am concerned, although I agree at once that to have a satisfied staff would be a great contribution to that end. Nor should any of us be under any doubt that even if these immediate problems were to be solved, that would allay the troubles which are current in educational circles. There would still be fundamental grievances such as pensions for dependants, the starting salary and the long period before full salary is attained.

The background to the problem lies in the following facts. In Scotland, there are 2,000 uncertificated teachers. The teaching profession resents the dilution of the profession to that extent. In Glasgow, there are 56 classes on part- time instruction. There are 23 further classes with a measure of part-time instruction. These classes cover 3,000 children. In five junior secondary schools, there are 1,370 pupils on part-time instruction. Glasgow requires 1,200 qualified teachers. There are 853 teachers over 65 years of age who are still employed throughout Scotland. We have half-day teachers. Children in some classes have a different teacher every other month. These conditions have piled up to such an extent that apart from the salary question, teachers are extremely concerned about the condition of education and the public and parents are lending their support.

To try to meet the problem, the Secretary of State and the Department have, over a number of years, adopted a series of stopgaps and expediencies instead of getting down to the fundamental problem and dealing with it and giving to education the priority which some of us consider that it deserves. We had, first, the training regulations which lowered the standards of entry for women to the teaching colleges some years ago when the hon. Member for Fife, East (Sir J. Henderson-Stewart) was Joint Under-Secretary of State. We had a form of dilution when third-class honours graduates were allowed to teach certain subjects in secondary schools. Retired teachers have been pressed to return to service for an annual emolument of about £100. There has been a recent appeal to married women to return to teaching. How can mutual understanding be established between teachers and children in circumstances like these? It is because there has been a lack of continuity in many cases of teaching that there is a lack of confidence in the children, and particularly at the important stage of the 12-plus examination.

I pass over the important point of the wastage of pupils who leave school at the age of 15. Those who enter a senior secondary school have the intention, first, of staying for the five years, but it is overall the practice that two-thirds of these children leave before completing the full course. It is from that potential that we could have had in the past a greater supply of teachers had some of the suggestions which we and the teachers have made been adopted.

Not only that, but there are no fewer than half a dozen Reports which the Secretary of State has had supplied to him since 1951. First, there was the Departmental Report on the Supply of Teachers, in 1951, and there was a second one in 1953 which reiterated that information and which pointed out that the number taking the school leaving certificate at that time should be increased, but that that would require more teachers. There was another in 1957, but the third Report given to him was the Appleton Report, in 1955, on the Supply of Teachers of Mathematics and Science in Scotland. There was, in 1957, the interim Report of the Knox Committee and there was its final Report in 1959. The existence of these Reports is the answer to those who are now saying that we need a Royal Commission. The answer is that the information is all there. What is needed and what has been lacking is the will to act upon some of the suggestions and recommendations which have been made.

The Knox Committee made recommendations, but that Committee expressly stated that it was against—and it recommended against—this proposal to introduce a new category of teachers, the non-graduate male. This is one of the questions which have been circulated, I understand, by the Secretary of State for consideration. By teachers training at colleges, and by all those interested in education, that proposal is looked upon as an attempt to depreciate the standards of teachers and is looked upon, too, as an attack upon their profession.

With the Knox Committee's Report, there was a minority Report, and one of the things which some of us are anxious to know is whether the minority Report, made by the hon. Lady the Member for Renfrew, East (Miss Harvie Anderson) is influencing the Secretary of State in circulating this question at all. However, I make no further comment on that, because I have not given the hon. Lady notice that I would refer to her. Of course, it must not be thought that I am making a personal attack upon her. She is free to make that proposal. However, so far as we know, this is the only source from which this proposal has come, and it is deprecated. I mean that the quality of the suggestion is deprecated.

It would be a fair resumé of the reasons which the Department will give for even considering this proposal to say that in the last thirty years post-primary pupils have increased in number by, I think, about 60 per cent., and that due to the raising of the school-leaving age, more pupils are staying on to complete the five years' course. It is true that there are more staying on, but the answer to that is that far more would stay on if we had more teachers, and that is no argument for deprecating teachers' standards. Further, it may be said that the new certificate to be introduced next year will mean that still more young people will stay on after 15, and because of the developments in further education and the rest, more men will be attracted to the senior secondary schools and so deplete the number of male teachers in the primary schools in which it is desirable that a number should still remain. My hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow, Shettleston (Sir M. Galpern) will, no doubt, attempt to deal with these points effectively. There are only one or two on which I want to make comment.

To go back to the introduction of the non-graduate teacher means that we go back to 1924. Prior to that time, it is true, non-graduates were entering into Scottish education, and I must say that some of them were amongst the best teachers I, personally, had. But they were entering then for different reasons. In those days there were economic reasons and economic hardship which prevented capable men from taking degrees, and the change which was made was hailed as a great advance for Scottish education, but surely the Secretary of State will not argue that we should go back thirty-six years when Scottish education is looked upon as being one of the most advanced in the world?

That question has been posed—and it is the straw which has broken the camel's back, and is the latest part of the background of dissatisfaction—whether, to maintain a desirable proportion of men, these regulations should be introduced. In the absence of information as to how the practical difficulties are to be overcome I think that the public generally and teachers in particular are quite right in their conclusion that the intention of the suggestion is to lower the qualifications for entry and the standards of the teaching profession and of education as a whole. That I deplore. Surely this is a challenge we have to meet. We should not be going back to the old days.

I am surprised that the Secretary of State does not claim great credit for what has been happening and the progress which has been made in the recruitment of graduate teachers over the last few years. It has gone up each year from 1956 to 1960, the figures for those years being respectively 670, 685, 802, 894 and 915. I should have thought that that was most encouraging. Indeed, the Knox Committee itself said that if we had 930 graduates entering the profession annually till 1967 a satisfactory staffing situation could be reached then, and that thereafter a replacement of 800 a year would be necessary. There is, too, the planned development of the universities, and if the Secretary of State has any confidence at all in the progress and success which have been achieved in the development of the universities, I cannot understand why such a question has been circulated should be circulated at all.

The mere circulation of the question seems to suggest to many people that those who thought it up do not fully comprehend the nature of the real problem. There is no justification on the ground of shortage of teachers for introducing the non-graduate men. If this is persisted in, it will devalue the graduate, and that will mean that, as the number of graduates declines, the number of non-graduates will increase. We may be successful in getting numbers, but the quality will, of course, decline.

Here is a thing which the Secretary of State will have to face. I have here an advertisement from the Schoolmaster, in which the Royal Air Force invites applications from teachers for a period of sixteen years, which period of service leads to a pension of at least £455 a year and a minimum tax-free gratuity of £1,365. Thereafter, they can go back into teaching in our schools. On the other hand, a teacher who leaves the profession to go to any other job is not allowed to continue teaching in the schools with pay and pension. There are counter-attractions, such as the R.A.F. offers. I admit the difficulty the Secretary of State has to face. I want to be perfectly fair.

What is the situation? The Secretary of State is faced with the threat of a strike on 8th May unless he gives an assurance that the suggestions for the dilution of the profession are abandoned and that an increase of salaries acceptable to the profession has been negotiated by that time. Let none of us underestimate the militant spirit of the teachers or their detestation of this proposal. I want to offer the Secretary of State a means of overcoming the dilemma and to suggest a solution to this problem. I hesitate to use the phrase "a way out", but I earnestly believe that there is a solution. I am not authorised to advance this by any organisation. Indeed, I may lay myself open to abuse from certain quarters. The Secretary of State does not want a strike, parents do not want a strike, and the public do not want one. The only people who want a strike are the children, but for quite other reasons.

The first thing that the Secretary of State must do is to disabuse his mind of such terms as have appeared in leading articles in the Press about the Government eating humble pie and about loss of face and loss of dignity. How often are international problems decided by the likes and dislikes of people in high places! If the right hon. Gentleman becomes consumed with these considerations primarily and the original merits or demerits become blurred it could lead to a prolongation of the situation. The Secretary of State said a week ago that the negotiations would not be hastened by outside pressure, and, understandably, he wants to give the impression that he will not be influenced by strike talk.

I think that most reasonable people, including both men and women teachers, would accept that claims for salary increases should go through the normal statutory procedure. It is to the first proposal that I want to devote my attention and to suggest that the Government's defence is weak. This proposal has been in circulation for some time. It has been considered by the local' authorities and training authorities and the replies are now in the hands of the Secretary of State. Has the right hon. Gentleman received them all? Has he not sufficient evidence in his hands now not only as a result of these replies, but also from the tone of the meeting which was held the other day to warrant his making an early statement, unofficially or officially, that this matter has been withdrawn and that he does not want any further consideration given to it? I believe that if he made such a statement there would be a relaxation of tension and of the pressure for a decision on increases in salary on 1st May.

I am sustained in that belief by comments in leading articles in the Scotsman and the Glasgow Herald. The latter newspaper says that: The Scottish Education Committee must share the blame for the trouble which has followed in the wake of their suggestion (or proposal) for dilution and must be held wholly responsible for the teachers' violent reaction to the unconvincing comparison of teaching and Civil Service salaries. The Scotsman said: It would be folly to attempt such a change without the co-operation, not to speak of in face of the active opposition of teachers. I ask the Secretary of State to consider this matter extremely seriously. There is no loss of face or dignity involved. It is not proposals that would be withdrawn. It is only a question suggested for negotiation. Once regulations are made or introduced into the House they cannot be withdrawn. It is true that draft regulations could be introduced and they might offer scope for discussion, but even they would add to the suspicion that what was contained in the draft was what the Department finally wanted.

It is said that we are living in an affluent society, but I believe that society should have its priorities right and that education must not suffer the same debasement that has visited some of our social services recently. Apparently we can find time in the House to debate a Betting and Gaming Bill and a Street Offences Bill, both of which are now Acts of Parliament, and a Licensing Bill, but on a subject of this kind we do not seem to have the same sense of priority.

Our young people, ill-prepared for the challenge, leave school to enter a society which arouses their meretricious and acquisitive instincts, titivated and encouraged by cheap books, cheap amusements and juke box tycoons. The people best fitted to help society in this matter are qualified teachers. I hope that at an early date the Secretary of State will make a statement which will allay the ire that has been aroused and encourage children to grow up in a Scottish educational system of which we can continue to be proud.

12.35 p.m.

Sir Myer Galpern (Glasgow, Shettleston)

I find myself forced to preface my remarks with the strongest possible condemnation of the Secretary of State's action in refusing to provide a copy of the memorandum which we are discussing today. I made several attempts to obtain this document, knowing full well that probably one of the answers to the debate would be that this is not a proposal for dilution, but merely a questionnaire to ascertain the views of various bodies who are in a position to give authentic and well-informed opinion.

Nevertheless, I believe that hon. Members ought to be able to read this memorandum and should not be told, as we have been told, that it was a confidential document—so "confidential" that every newspaper in the country that cared to comment on it was able to do so and teachers have already held several meetings on the basis of what is contained in it. We who are called upon to debate a question based on this memorandum are in complete ignorance of the contents of the document.

It may well have been that had we seen the document we should have been able to accept the Secretary of State's assurance that he had no serious intention and that it was purely exploratory on the subject of dilution. But the Secretary of State seems to regard the document as so essential to the defence of the country that it might be a betrayal of the Official Secrets Act if an hon. Member were able to peruse it before entering the debate. I hope, therefore, that in future a document which has become universal property, but which, unfortunately, in this case I have not been able to obtain, will be made accessible to hon. Members.

The Education (Scotland) Act, 1945 was a blueprint for the development of education for a number of years. It was an excellent Act if only we had been able to implement its admirable proposals. But we have not been able to erect the beautiful edifice that we saw in that Act because the fundamental prerequisite to any development and extension of our educational system is our ability to attract larger numbers of first-class men and women into the teaching profession.

My hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow, Maryhill (Mr. Hannan) has referred to the innumerable committees and working parties which have been engaged on this problem for a great number of years. In 1945, the Advisory Council on Education stressed the need for urgent revision of teachers' salary scales and said: We make this recommendation with the object of obtaining a permanent improvement in the supply of teachers both in quantity and in quality. The Council was forced to make that recommendation because as recently as 1945 one county authority in Scotland paid a male graduate teacher with teacher-training college qualification a commencing salary of £200 per annum, or less than £4 a week, which was 8s. a week less than the salary paid to a young man on entry into the police force.

When I asked the Secretary of State, on Tuesday, whether he could see his way to appoint a committee of inquiry into the state of Scottish education, he sheltered behind the fact that innumerable committees had already reported to him and that this would mean a duplication of their work. But what serious attention has the right hon. Gentleman paid to the reports of those committees? Here we have a responsible and, indeed, exceptional body, the Knox Committee, of which I was a member, and which deliberated for eighteen months and made a recommendation on this very subject of whether to introduce non-graduate males into the teaching profession to serve in primary schools. The Knox Committee recommended that there should be no departure from the requirement that men teachers of general subjects must normally hold a university degree. There was a minority Report, but the person signing it was prepared to limit the introduction of non-graduate males for a short period until the shortage of teachers had ended.

Why does the Secretary of State see fit, at this juncture, to issue a questionnaire when all the facts and all the evidence clearly show that the number of graduates being attracted to the profession is steadily rising? There is no doubt that the new bursary proposals announced yesterday—the Glasgow Herald and the Scotsman have condemned them because of their inadequacy—are a slight improvement on existing financial awards to students entering universities and other bodies of central and higher education. That in itself is bound to lead to an increase in the number of students who will be available for graduation. With the increasing number remaining at school and the increasing number proceeding to universities, we should be able to obtain the number that we think we ought to have—1,800 graduates per year ready to come into the profession.

In 1958, 53.7 per cent. of the total number of graduates in arts and pure science at the universities came into the teaching profession. Our objective should be to raise the proportion to 55 per cent. If we can achieve that, we shall not have to consider dilution of the profession in the primary schools.

We read advertisements in the national newspapers, as I did yesterday, showing that industry and commerce are trying to attract more and more graduates. I have in my hand an advertisement seeking two graduate trainees for production. Personnel officers in the larger establishments are required to have university degrees. Yet the Government are toying with the idea of diluting the teaching profession, the very people who are in the forefront of providing that pool of educated manpower.

There is no doubt that had the profession's salary scales been put on a proper basis ten years ago—this matter has been smouldering for years and has now burst into fire—there would have been no question of considering dilution because we should have attracted an adequate number of graduates to the profession. The more we talk about dilution of the profession the less likely we are to attract more graduates, because graduates want to feel that the profession is comparable with other professions and that there is recognition of its worth-whileness. They do not like to feel that it is necessary to bring in people who have not the requisite qualifications.

Take the dental profession. There is an acute shortage of dentists, particularly in the school dental service. Twenty or thirty years ago there used to be dentists who had no proper qualifications, but there is no talk today about dilution of the dental profession by the introduction of unqualified people with makeshift training to carry out the essential work done by the overburdened profession. Why should we do it in the teaching profession?

There is no doubt whatever that there will be a strike on our hands on 8th May. The Glasgow Education Committee yesterday set up a committee to deal with the situation which will result. If it should happen, all the blame can rightly and justly be laid at the door of the Secretary of State. I support the statement of my hon. Friend the Member for Maryhill that the Secretary of State can yet solve this problem and stave off any action. This is not precipitate action; it is something that has been smouldering for fourteen or fifteen years. The teachers have been very patient. The Secretary of State should announce that whatever was contained in the circular Which we have been denied the opportunity of seeing has now been withdrawn and that he will not consider dilution of the profession. Indeed, there is no need for it; we need more male graduates in the primary schools.

I conclude with a quotation from the leading article in the Glasgow Herald on 28th March: The Government may once have thought that 'dilution' was practicable; they cannot think so now.

12.46 p.m.

Mr. John Rankin (Glasgow, Govan)

Almost two years ago I stood in this very place pleading with the Minister of State for Scotland to encourage the Secretary of State to give closer attention to the problems of teaching and the discontents affecting Scottish teachers. On that occasion the two topics disturbing the teachers were salaries and shortage of staff, with its corollaries of under-taught classes and overfull classes. Since then, another problem has developed. It is worth while noting that the problem of dilution has developed only within the last two years.

The Secretary of State has tried to create the feeling that this is a situation he is only exploring. I quote what I said on the previous occasion: I trust that the suggestion in the current Report of the Advisory Council on Education of a reduction in the qualifications of teachers entering Scottish schools is not one of the methods proposed by the Government to overcome the staffing shortage."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 25th March, 1959; Vol. 602, c. 1478.] Those were my remarks two years ago when very little was being said about this suggested remedy.

There is not the slightest doubt that in sending out the memorandum which he has kept secret from us the Secretary of State had had in mind the suggestion in the Report from the Advisory Council on Education in Scotland which I quoted two years ago. That suggestion has inflamed the teaching profession, because every teacher knows that good labour is generally sacrificed to bad labour or, if one puts it in terms of what is called Gresham's Law, cheap labour always tends to drive out dear labour.

Education in Scotland has always been cheap. That is one of the great tragedies from which it suffers. Of course, I agree that the problem in that respect is, to some extent, historical, because it goes back to the days when the Scottish student, fortified by his poke of meal, used to trudge limitless miles in search of learning so that he might acquire it for himself and bring its benefits to others. It was cheap education, and those who chose to put what they had been taught into the minds and lives of others by teaching were repaid with salaries that were merely fit to keep body and soul together.

It was on that basis that Scottish education grew up, and, because it produced one who earned a tremendous respect in Scottish life—the dominie who brought forward the lad o'pairts who went, in turn, to university and then to all parts of the world to carry the name of Scotland and to distinguish himself—we concentrated education round an individual, again to the detriment of teaching as an organised profession. It is that which the teachers of Scotland are seeking to overcome.

They recognise that for everyone, whether working in a shipyard or an engineering shop, or whether he is a dentist, doctor or minister, there must be an accepted minimum standard of entry into his craft or profession. Teachers are seeking to establish that for themselves, but not, I fear, with the co-operation of the Secretary of State, who is their parliamentary chief. He sees the reduction in standards as an easy and cheap method of solving a problem which would otherwise cost him a great deal more money than he is prepared to spend.

To meet the problems that face him, all sorts of bodies have made suggestions, including Glasgow Corporation and the Knox Committee, the E.I.S., and also hon. Members of this House. They have suggested to the Secretary of State ways whereby he could help to remedy some of the difficulties that face teaching and teachers in Scotland. In the debate to which I have referred the Minister of State, speaking for the Secretary of State, said: My right hon. Friend is well aware of the acute difficulties under which the schools are working. He went on to defend what the Secretary of State had so far done, and added Great advances have, therefore, been made."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 25th March, 1959; Vol. 602, c. 1485–6.] If those "great advances" which he claimed had been made are judged by what is happening in Scotland now, they show signs not of advance but of the complete failure of the Secretary of State to face up to the responsibilities that confront him now in education.

For the first time in the history of the profession, the teachers have indicated that they will come out on strike. That is an alarming situation. I have been associated with the profession for a long while. Time and again there have been attempts to get teachers to take what is called coercive action, but the general body were opposed to it on the ground that they had a great responsibility to the children, and that that responsibility should be their first consideration.

Now, however, they are beginning to feel that they are being sacrificed to the children and for the children; and they are compelled to this course from a sense of complete frustration. They have tried every door, but none has yielded. They are told that "great advances" have been made, but those "advances" still leave thousands of children in Glasgow with part-time education; leave schools under-staffed and teachers underpaid; and now threaten them with a diminution of their professional status.

It is because of these things, and because they have failed in every approach, either by themselves or through the local authorities, that the teachers have now decided to employ the ultimate sanction of the strike. I say to the Secretary of State that his onus is greater than ever. He must not allow this strike to take place. He is the man who can prevent it. He may have to yield something, but in yielding he will not lose face. Nor will he lose respect. Indeed, he will earn it.

He must decide whether the coffers of the Treasury are to pay the price demanded, or whether the children of Scotland are to pay it. If he says that the children must pay the price, then his name will fall in the estimation of every right-thinking person in Scotland. I feel that he will not do that—that he will not ask the children to pay. He will see that the Treasury foots the Bill. If he says that such is his intention, then he will earn the gratitude of every parent and every person in Scotland who values the word "education".

1.0 p.m.

The Secretary of State for Scotland (Mr. John Maclay)

I should like, first, to add to what the hon. Member for Glasgow, Maryhill (Mr. Hannan) said at the beginning of his speech, my great regret at the reason why the hon. Lady the Member for Lanarkshire, North (Miss Herbison) is not with us today. We all wish her a very rapid recovery from the illness which has kept her from our counsels during the last ten days.

I am grateful to hon. Members for having raised this matter this morning and giving me the chance to speak, even relatively briefly, on this grave issue which has arisen in the teaching profession in Scotland. I am under no possible illusion about the extent of the concern felt among Scottish teachers which I find from reading the Press and from other sources.

As has been emphasised this morning, the concern has been largely about what has been regarded as an attack made on the standards of the profession. In a series of Answers over a good many months, right back into last year, I have tried to make it clear that there is no question of an attack on the standards of the profession, and I welcome this opportunity further to explain the position.

Let me say, then, first, and emphatically, that I have not announced any decision to introduce to Scottish schools men teachers on general subjects who have not graduated from a university. I have not made any proposal that that should be done. It is the word "proposal" which is causing so much trouble. It is clear, from a number of references which I have read in the Press in recent weeks to "dilutionary proposals," that many people, in spite of what I have said, continue to state the contrary. It must be clear that we would not propose a new course of action unless its merits and demerits had been fully weighed and decisions taken on them. I repeat that no such decision has been taken and no proposal has been made.

Mr. Emrys Hughes (South Ayrshire) rose——

Mr. Maclay

I would rather keep this as a consecutive speech.

Mr. Hughes

Can the right hon. Gentleman give a definite assurance that it will not be proposed?

Mr. Maclay

If the hon. Member will allow me to develop my speech, I will explain all the steps which would have to be taken before any situation like that would arise.

What has happened is as follows. The present regulations for the training of teachers have not been radically revised since 1931. We are now in the course of carrying out such a revision. The first part of this general review of training, dealing solely with the system of administration, was concluded in 1959. The second part, dealing with matters such as standards, content of training, and certification, started in June, 1960, with the issue of a memorandum by the Scottish Education Department.

Following normal practice, that memorandum was sent as a confidential document to teachers' organisations, local authority associations, training authorities, universities, churches and other interested bodies. The hon. Member for Glasgow, Shettleston (Sir M. Galpern) made strong comments about this matter, and I will say a little more about it. That this memorandum was confidential was completely normal practice. Precisely the same procedure was followed in the first part of the review.

As hon. Members, particularly the hon. Member for Shettleston, know it is the general practice for preliminary confidential discussions to be held prior to the framing of legislative proposals, not only on educational matters, but in many other fields where local authorities and other bodies are concerned. I agree that this issue has raised the important question of whether, when a document of this kind gets wide circulation, it can be treated as confidential. I am prepared to look at that, but it was no disrespect to the House, but simply normal procedure from which I could not suddenly depart, without consulting the bodies accustomed to getting these documents, that the memorandum was sent out as a confidential document. However, that is a matter which I would like to study in principle to see whether there is any way of getting over the difficulty.

Without quoting from the memorandum, it may be helpful if I mention some of the questions on which I wished to have some guidance. The question of the employment of non-graduate men teachers has caused very strong feeling, but that was only one of the questions. Among the others were standards of entry to the various courses of teacher training, the content, standards and length of the courses, the system of certification of teachers, the acceptability of various academic qualifications, the different systems of concurrent or consecutive training, the system of probation, and so on. What we did was to ask for observations on those various questions from the different bodies which I have mentioned. We asked for their views and opinions on the lines of action which it might be best to take.

Frankly, I should have been failing in my duty to Scottish education if I had not ensured that all those important issues were thoroughly discussed, even including the difficult question of non-graduate men teachers in general subjects. We have a challenging period in front of us. It is true, as the hon. Member for Maryhill and the hon. Member for Shettleston pointed out, that there has been a remarkable upsurge in recruitment to the colleges of education in the last few years. I will give the figures in percentages, because they are striking in that way, too; and the absolute figures have already been given. The number entering training in the current session is about 41 per cent. above the number four years ago. Within that figure, the number of university graduates has risen by about 35 per cent. That is very good progress.

I realise that hon. Members and people outside the House may wonder why, if that is the case, we should be worried about the long-term future—this is not just the short-term, but the long-term view which we are considering. The reason is that, on the other hand, there are factors such as the serious loss of women teachers in the first few years of service, mainly through marriage, a loss which is nowadays a very important factor. Moreover, the demand for teachers is increasing. It is not just the new bulge now entering primary schools, but the welcome tendency—very much to be welcomed—for a greater number of pupils to stay on after the age of 15. There is also the need to reduce the size of classes below the present permitted maxima, a matter to which the Government have given first priority. We have the prospect of raising the school-leaving age to 16 in due course, and there is also the forthcoming expansion of further education.

On the supply side, we do not yet know with precision how many additional teachers such developments will require, nor how many we are likely to get. That will be more clear when the Departmental Committee on Supply, which is at present sitting, reports, and that should not now be very long. That Departmental Committee consists of two directors of education, the General Secretary of the Educational Institute of Scotland, the secretary of the Scottish Council for the Training of Teachers, and two officers of my Department. Beyond question, all those factors will require a further expansion of the intake of the profession which, I emphasise, in the United Kingdom as a whole already employs about one-third of the graduate population, a very large proportion.

As well as the numerical problems, there will also be staffing problems due to changing circumstances of a purely educational nature. For example, there is the radical change in secondary schools which has taken place over the last thirty years. We have to face the fact that those schools now contain many pupils of average or lower ability who would not formerly have proceeded to secondary education. I am delighted that they are there, but it is a factor to be appreciated. There is a different type of child in the secondary schools, and how and what such children should be taught and what is the best training for those who are to teach them are obvious problems which we have to consider.

I emphasise that I have not attempted to come to any conclusion on any of the matters which have been under discussion and the strongly expressed views of the teachers will be very much in my mind when I do so. It must be recognised that there are good educational as well supply reasons for at least considering the question of non-graduate men teachers rationally and responsibly. It would be very irresponsible of me merely to ignore it. I am explaining why this bad word "dilution" did not appear in the document.

Mr. Rankin

Will the right hon. Gentleman define what he means by non-graduate men teachers? Does he mean non-qualified teachers?

Mr. Maclay

I do not think that I should go beyond the careful remarks I have been making, because this is a difficult problem.

I have made up my mind on nothing, and I have proposed nothing. This and the many other questions which must be considered are being discussed by officers of my Department with the bodies who were asked to comment on the memorandum. It is impossible to complete this round of preliminary discussions for some weeks, and I cannot curtail them without discourtesy to these important bodies whose views have yet to be heard. When, and only when, these discussions are concluded will I be in a position to reach tentative conclusions on all the questions involved in the light of all the opinions expressed. As I have said, I do not think that it would be right for me to do so until that stage is reached.

The House doubtless knows that I recently met a deputation from the three main teachers' associations who wished to know how far I should be prepared to go to meet the teachers' demand that discussion of this question of the male non-graduate teachers of general subjects should be abandoned. I told them that I could not agree to abandon discussion of any of the questions in advance of hearing and considering the views of the bodies I had consulted but I assured them—and I ask the hon. Gentleman to notice this—that once the preliminary round of discussions had been completed, and I had formulated my views in the light of the opinions expressed I would certainly be willing to arrange for my tentative conclusions on the main questions at issue to be discussed with their organisations—and with the other bodies—as soon as possible and before they were published as definite proposals in draft regulations.

I emphasise the word "before", for reasons which hon. Members will appreciate. I shall not limit the period for representations on the draft Regulations to the minimum statutory period of 40 days. I shall allow at least three months. It is only after all representations on the draft Regulations have been fully considered that I will make the Regulations and lay them before the House.

I have arranged for the second round of consultations before draft Regulations are issued, because, as I have said, there has been no fundamental revision since 1931, and before any proposals are made they will obviously need the most careful thought. Furthermore, I want to make it perfectly clear that whether my first tentative conclusion is for or against any particular proposal there will be ample time for further discussion and consideration. I will still be prepared not only to listen to further arguments on it, but, if the arguments are cogent, to modify any initial views I may have formed. I am trying to stress that there will be plenty of time to discuss these matters, but it is extremely hard to say that I must be tied to a date by which I do not think it will be possible to get my discussions completed.

Mr. Hannan

Will the right hon. Gentleman bear in mind that it is this very uncertainty and the fact that he will have plenty of time which is adding to the anxiety, particularly as the summer term examinations are to be held in May?

Mr. Maclay

I realise that there must be some reason for the anxiety, but I think that what I have said shows that we are approaching the matter in a reasonable way, and I emphasise, both on this subject and on the salaries side, that there are others besides myself involved. There are the local authorities and many other people involved in this matter.

Hon. Members did not dwell heavily on the question of salaries, and I do not want to take up too much of the time of the House on this matter today, but it might be wise if I made my position absolutely clear. The teachers' representatives on the National Joint Council to deal with the salaries of teachers in Scotland tabled a claim in January for an increase on present salaries and for a reduction of all salary scales to ten years. The Council is the body to whose recommendations I am required by Statute "to have regard" before making salary regulations, that is, before making any changes in present scales.

The recommendation may be reached by agreement between the two sides, or as a result of arbitration between them. In either event it rests with me to accept, modify, or reject the recommendations which are put to me. Negotiations are, I understand, in progress on the Council; negotiations which will, in due course, result in recommendations to me. In these circumstances, I think that it would be improper for me to comment on the merits of the teachers' claim and thereby to prejudice, or appear to prejudice, in any way the Council's deliberations.

It has been suggested—not this morning, but in some quarters—that the legitimate salaries claims of the teachers have always been ignored. I have to be careful about this, because I do not want to prejudice the current negotiations and I would not dream of doing so, but it is only fair to remind the House that there have been four salaries increases in the last five years. The current salaries regulations were made as recently as 1st January, 1960—only fifteen months ago—and at that time it was understood that they were to remain in force for three years and that they implemented in full the recommendations agreed by the Council, that is, by the representatives of teachers and employers.

Indeed, on one or two points of detail we gave the teachers more than the Council recommended. They also went a long way—and this has a bearing on the speech of the hon. Member for Shettleston—towards implementing the recommendations of the Special Committee of the Advisory Council—the Knox Committee—in its Report on Measures to Improve the Supply of Teachers. I realise that they did not go the whole way, but many of the recommendations which had been brought to the attention of the National Joint Council were accepted.

It is also suggested that the present negotiations are taking an unconscionable time. I am in no way responsible for the conduct of these negotiations, but I think that it is only fair to the Council to say that this charge seems unjust. It is, I understand, true that the negotiating committee has met only once since the teachers' pay claim was tabled, but I should have thought that it was obvious that there must be a fairly long interval in negotiations of this kind after a claim has been tabled and before a counteroffer can be made, unless the claim is to be rejected out of hand.

The cost and implications of the claim must be worked out and considered. Alternative proposals may have to be considered in detail, and, as hon. Members know, teachers' salaries in Scotland are an extremely complicated structure and one has to think out carefully the cost of the proposals and what the implementation of them will mean. It is bound to take a considerable time. In short, it would clearly be unreasonable to suppose that the fact that the negotiating committee has met only once implies that nothing is being done about the teachers' claim. The tempo of the negotiations is broadly in line with what it has been on the previous occasions which I have been able to check.

May I now deal with one final point mentioned by the hon. Member for Shettleston who quoted from the Scotsman. It has been alleged that I have wilfully prejudiced the present negotiations by the Written Answer which I gave to a Question by the hon. Member for Coatbridge and Airdrie (Mr. Dempsey). This is not the case. In reply to a Question from the hon. Member, asking for a comparison of the salaries of teachers in 1939 and 1961 with those of other salary earners, I set out the facts on teachers' salaries and the salaries of the main grades in the Civil Service.

I made it clear in my Answer that the Civil Service had been chosen because salaries in the Civil Service are now based on the principle of fair comparison with salaries earned in comparable jobs outside the Service, and the movement of Civil Service salaries between 1939 and the present day gives some indication of the general movement of salaries in this period. In any case, no other information was readily available. Indeed, so far as I am aware no one who has criticised the Answer has suggested any more appropriate yardstick by which this movement might be measured.

I was not in any sense comparing salaries and qualifications of particular grades in the Civil Service with those of the various groups of teachers. I was giving information in response to a Parliamentary Question, and I really cannot assume responsibility for the conclusions drawn from that information, nor, as hon. Members know, can I refuse to give factual answers to Questions put to me in the House. That was the position. I was asked a Question and I had to answer it.

Mr. Emrys Hughes

The right hon. Gentleman could not evade it.

Mr. Maclay

The hon. Member says that I could not evade it. He knows that over all the years I have never evaded a factual question.

I have tried this morning once again to make quite clear what the facts of the position are. I find it difficult to conceive how any section of a great and responsible profession, for which I have the highest regard, can seriously consider strike action in relation to prospective proposals before any conclusions have been reached as to what these proposals should be. I understand the intensity of feeling on the matter. I have tried to explain why the discussion of this point was stimulated and, as I have said before, full weight will be given to the views of the teaching profession, and there will be further opportunity for discussions with all concerned before any conclusions are reached.

I can assure hon. Members that questions of "face" have never caused me any great concern. When I am convinced that a thing is right I am always prepared to do it, and I will continue to watch this position with the greatest care. On both the main questions on which attention has been focussed by certain sections of the teaching profession discussions are going on at the moment. It would not be right for me to prejudge the issue in either case, and I hope that it will be accepted inside this House, and outside, that this attitude is reasonable and is, indeed, the only one which anyone with my responsibilities could properly adopt.

Sir Colin Thornton-Kemsley (North Angus and Mearns)

In the event of the Committee recommending an increase in salaries to teachers, will my right hon. Friend give an undertaking that they will not be prejudiced by the long delay in arriving at a decision and that favourable consideration will be given to making the award retrospective?

Mr. Maclay

I cannot give any positive assurance of that kind on the Floor of the House, because these negotiations are under way and it would be quite wrong for me to say anything which might prejudice the course of those negotiations.

Forward to