Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps she is taking to ensure that specialist Citizenship teachers are recruited and retained; and what steps she is taking to extend bursaries to this subject.

Answered by Georgia Gould - Minister of State (Education)

The department is working with the sector to re-establish teaching as an attractive profession across all subjects, including citizenship. As a first step, this government has increased teacher pay by almost 10% over two years.

Our Plan for Change is committed to recruiting 6,500 new expert teachers across secondary and special schools, and our colleges over the course of this Parliament to ensure sufficient teachers across all subjects. We are making good progress with the workforce has grown by 2,346 on a full-time equivalent basis between 2023/24 and 2024/25 in secondary and special schools, where it is needed most.

Trainee bursaries are reviewed annually to ensure we are focusing on the subjects most in need. Our commitment of over £200 million for bursaries in 2026/27 follows improved recruitment, with 10% more acceptances to start initial teacher training courses this year compared to last year and the teacher leaver rate falling to 9%, one of the lowest on record. In 2024/25 3,685 teachers taught citizenship.

Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment her Department has made of the potential impact of the exclusion of citizenship from the teacher training bursary list on the (a) recruitment of specialist teachers and (b) ability of schools to deliver high-quality citizenship education.

Answered by Georgia Gould - Minister of State (Education)

The department is working with the sector to re-establish teaching as an attractive profession across all subjects, including citizenship. As a first step, this government has increased teacher pay by almost 10% over two years.

Our Plan for Change is committed to recruiting 6,500 new expert teachers across secondary and special schools, and our colleges over the course of this Parliament to ensure sufficient teachers across all subjects. We are making good progress with the workforce has grown by 2,346 on a full-time equivalent basis between 2023/24 and 2024/25 in secondary and special schools, where it is needed most.

Trainee bursaries are reviewed annually to ensure we are focusing on the subjects most in need. Our commitment of over £200 million for bursaries in 2026/27 follows improved recruitment, with 10% more acceptances to start initial teacher training courses this year compared to last year and the teacher leaver rate falling to 9%, one of the lowest on record. In 2024/25 3,685 teachers taught citizenship.

Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how many new teachers have been recruited since July 2024; and how many of those are citizenship teachers.

Answered by Georgia Gould - Minister of State (Education)

Information on the school workforce, including the number of teachers in state-funded schools, is published in the ‘School workforce in England’ statistical publication available here: https://explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk/find-statistics/school-workforce-in-england/2024.

41,736 qualified teachers joined state-funded schools in England for the 2024/25 academic year, the latest date for which data is available. This has been available since 5 June 2025 and, can be found here: https://explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk/data-tables/permalink/3d4415a2-a099-427d-d209-08de2129b4fd..

A breakdown of the above figure by subject taught is not available.

Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps she is taking to ensure that Ofsted (a) inspections and (b) public reporting properly reflect schools’ statutory obligations to deliver Citizenship education.

Answered by Georgia Gould - Minister of State (Education)

These are matters for His Majesty’s Chief Inspector, Sir Martyn Oliver. I have asked him to write to my hon. Friend, the Member for Lewisham North and a copy of his reply will be placed in the Libraries of both Houses.

Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps she is taking to ensure that Citizenship is treated on an equal footing with other statutory National Curriculum subjects within Ofsted’s inspection framework.

Answered by Georgia Gould - Minister of State (Education)

These are matters for His Majesty’s Chief Inspector, Sir Martyn Oliver. I have asked him to write to my hon. Friend, the Member for Lewisham North and a copy of his reply will be placed in the Libraries of both Houses.

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