A closer analysis of the number of children at the upper ages in recent years is as follows: 14. Teachers' Salaries (Elementary Education).—At the time when the Board's Estimates for 1925-26 were made, the period for which the Burnham standard scales were adopted by agreement between the teachers and their employers was about to expire, and no agreement had been arrived at as to the salaries which were to be in operation after 31st March, 1925; but the matter had been referred by the Burnham Committees to Lord Burnham for arbitration. It may be convenient here to summarise the course of events affecting teachers' salaries during recent years. Pre-war Salaries. In pre-war years, and throughout the war, there were no prescribed nor generally accepted scales of salary for teachers, but each L.E.A. and each body of employers arranged its own terms with its teachers. In the year 1914, the average salary of all teachers employed in the elementary schools was £97 per annum, and for the first three years of the war salaries remained stationary (a slight apparent increase of total expenditure being due to salary payments being made to teachers absent at the war and also to their substitutes). Salaries, 1917-1921. From 1st April, 1917, a “supplementary grant which was intended to be in aid of salaries and was so applied, was made by the Board of Education, who at the same time attached to it the condition that men certificated teachers should receive a minimum of £100 and women a minimum of £90; and at the time when this minimum was introduced many teachers were drawing salaries of lower amounts. During the four years, 1917 to 1921, the cost of living, as compared with a pre-war standard of 100, became : 1st January, 1918 1st January, 1919 1st January, 1920 1st November, 1920 1st January, 1921 and during those four years teachers' salaries with the addition of war bonuses moved upwards in an unregulated manner under the influence of the rise in the cost of living. At the beginning of that period, 1917-1921, salaries were £17,395,000 as compared with a pre-war figure of £16,416,000: at the end of it they had risen to £39,528,000 and it was not until after they had reached this level that the Burnham standard scales began to operate. During those four years 1917-1921, there was no standardising of the salaries, except to the extent of a provisional minimum" noticed below, but each L.E.A. made its own agreements with its teachers: and these agreements were not stable, by reason of the continued rise in prices and fall in the value of money, and the continued necessity which each area found for alterations and additions. Some scales professed to be permanent, and were rapidly superseded by other permanent" scales. scales. Others were professedly only provisional and temporary. The Burnham Committee, which was first convoked in August, 1919, devised a provisional minimum scale which came into operation as from 1st January, 1920, to be introduced by not more than four gradual stages. This provisional minimum scale was introduced into 242 areas, and affected 96,000 teachers out of about 170,000. The increased cost in those areas of the provisional minimum scale, as compared with the scales which it replaced, was £2,245,000 in 1920-21, due to rise to £3,710,000 by 1923-24 and this formed but a small part of the sum of more than £8,000,000, by which salaries increased in 1920-21, the remainder of the increase being due to the general causes described above. Salaries from 1921 onwards. The Burnham Standard Scales.The Burnham Committee made recommendations in September, 1920, for standard scales of salary, which were to operate from a date not later than 1st April, 1921, and were to last until March, 1925, i.e., for four years.. The Board of Education on receiving, the recommendations of the Burnham Committee in 1920, made a calculation, which subsequent events have proved to have been extremely close, of the cost of these scales if brought universally into effect. The Board's economy circular, number 1190, was issued in January, 1921. The Government in the same month approved the Burnham scales in principle, and in June, 1921, approved them in detail, with some modifications. In signifying approval in June, 1921, the Government stipulated for the gradual introduction of the scales by three equal annual instalments, and announced that they would disallow for grant purposes all expenditure in excess of the scales so introduced. Thus the adoption by the Government of the Burnham scales imposed definite limits to the Government's liabilities, definite standard scales whose cost was ascertainable being substituted, as from 1st April, 1921, for a large variety of unregulated salary scales whose cost was indefinite but continually rising. Effect of the Burnham Scales.-The immediate effect of the Burnham standard scales was to slow down (as from 1st April, 1921) the increase in salary expenditure. but with an abatement of 5 per cent.) 41,019,000 On the day previous to the introduction of the Burnham scales, the salaries current of adult full-time teachers were £39,524,850 ; but increases were due to be made under the scales in force on that date in many areas; in some areas the scales then in force were liable, but for the adoption of the Burnham standards, to be superseded by others more expensive, and in some areas the introduction of the allotted Burnham scale involved a reduction of the scales previously in force, or a disallowance of excess expenditure for calculation of grant. Thus the Burnham scales operated to increase the salaries in some areas but in others to restrict the increase; and the general effect was to regulate and stabilise salaries for four years. Contributions and Abatements.-As from 1st June, 1922, teachers were required by the Superannuation Act of 1922 to contribute 5 per cent. of their salaries to the Board, as pension contributions. At the beginning of the year 1922 the cost of living stood at 192 and during the year it fell to 178, or about the level at which it now stands; and in December of that year the teachers agreed with the L.E.As. that their salaries should undergo a voluntary abatement of 5 per cent. as from 1st April, 1923; this agreement was renewed later and operated for two years. It will be seen that the full Burnham scales have never been in general operation, because they were introduced by three equal annual stages, and before their introduction was complete the teachers were required to contribute 5 per cent. as pension contributions, and afterwards agreed to a voluntary abatement of their salaries by 5 per cent. Thus for the two years 1923-25, for each £100 of full Burnham salary, the employers paid £95, and the teachers received £90 5s. net (i.e., abated salary £95, less pension contribution at 5 per cent. on £95). The figures given above relate to the elementary school teachers' salaries, which in amount are about four-fifths of the whole; the history of the salaries of teachers in other grant- · aided schools was similar in its general outline. There are two erroneous ideas on this subject which have gained some currency (1) that the Burnham award which took effect in 1921 was the cause or the occasion of a very large increase in the total salary bill-an error which the figures given above may help to dispel, and (2) that the pre-Burnham salaries were an established system of salary scales, whereas in fact they were an unregulated chaos. Average Salaries.-The following tables show the movement of average salaries of adult full-time teachers in relation to cost of living. They are based on the rates current on 31st March annually. Adult full-time Teachers in Grant-aided Public Elementary Schools. (a) Average Salary as on 31st March. Note. The salaries of certificated teachers in 1914 were subject to pension contributions of £3 12s. per annum (men), and £2 8s. per annum (women). There were no pension contributions in 1920 or 1921. As from 1st June, 1922, the salaries of pensionable teachers (this includes all the classes in this table except the supplementary teachers) were subject to a pension contribution of 5 per cent. The figures in these tables show the salaries before deduction of any pension contributions. Adult full-time Teachers in Grant-aided Secondary Schools. Note. In 1914, the salaries of some of the secondary school teachers were subject to pension contributions under local schemes. There were no pension contributions in 1920 or 1921. As from 1st June, 1922, the salaries of pensionable teachers (this includes all the classes in this table) were subject to a pension .contribution of five per cent. The figures in these tables show the salaries before deduction of any pension contributions. 15. Numbers of teachers, and their ratio to numbers of pupils. (a) In Elementary Schools. As on 31st March. Total Number of Teachers- Number of Pu pils in Average Attend ance Number of Pupils in Aver 41,756 38,605 38,074 39,323 39,561 40,371 121,831 126,926 129,130 128,050 122,745 121,364 163,587 165,531 167,204 167,373 162,306 161,735 5,381,479 5,187,334 5,206,098 5,180,783 5,136,008 5,024,417 |