§ Mr. Marksasked the Secretary of State for Education and Science, what priority she is giving to primary education in the field of teachers' pay.
Mrs. Thatcher: The pay of schoolteachers in England and Wales is negotiated in the Burnham Committee. The pay scales do not in general terms distinguish between particular types of schools, but the new structure proposed by the management panel for introduction this year, which I support, would benefit primary school teachers in a number of important ways.
§ Mr. Marksasked the Secretary of State for Education and Science what priority she is giving to primary education in the field of teacher supply.
§ Mrs. ThatcherThe distribution of teachers between primary and secondary schools is a matter for local education authorities. It is estimated that pupil-teacher ratios for 1971 will show a considerably larger improvement over 1970 in primary schools than in secondary schools.