'More Teachers Than Ever' Quitting Classrooms

Nearly 50,000 teachers quit the profession in the last year - the highest number since records began - according to figures released by the Labour Party.

Teaching applications are also falling - down by 21,000 compared to this time last year - and are falling in key subjects such as English and maths, the data shows.

The Labour Party estimates that Britain will need almost 160,000 additional teachers over the next three years - yet on current trends there could be a shortfall of 65,000 applicants over this period.

On top of this, pupil numbers continue to grow - with a projected 582,000 more primary and secondary-age pupils by 2020 - requiring thousands more teachers just to maintain class sizes at their current levels.

Responding to the findings, the new shadow education secretary, Lucy Powell MP, said: "For years, this Government chose to ignore the growing problem with teacher supply, continuing instead to botch recruitment and do down the profession at every opportunity.

"As a result schools are now struggling against falling applications and the highest number of teachers quitting the profession on record.

"The Tories' failure to take this problem seriously is threatening standards in our schools and damaging the education of our children - it cannot go on any longer.

"Last week David Cameron claimed to care about social mobility - nothing is more important to raising standards, aspirations and social mobility than having excellent teachers in our schools."

But a Conservative Party spokesperson accused Ms Powell of resorting to "scaremongering with misleading statistics", claiming the number of teachers is at "an all-time high".

"Far from the picture painted by the Labour Party, teaching remains a hugely popular profession with 3% more people due to start postgraduate teacher training than this time last year," the spokesperson said.

"The latest figures show the number of former teachers coming back to the classroom has continued to rise year after year. As a result there are now 13,100 more full-time equivalent teachers than in 2010."