Underperforming teachers to face sack after one term

Under new proposals, schools could also be asked to share information on whether a teacher is being investigated for poor performance to stop “recycling” of weak staff.

The measures are part of a bid by government to crack down on poor teaching, amid concerns that it damages children’s education.

But two teachers’ unions condemned the move as “unnecessary and draconian”, with one leader calling it a “potential bully’s charter”.

Christine Blower, general secretary of the National Union of Teachers (NUT), said: “The changes to the appraisal and capability policies will rightly be seen by teachers as an attack on their professionalism and will anger and depress them in equal measure.”

She added: “What the government proposes is potentially a bully’s charter. The union believes that many well-functioning schools, where development and professionalism is prized, will not adopt [Michael] Gove’s model.

“If schools are serious about addressing the issue of teacher competence should it arise, they must do it in a fair fashion and not be constrained by a one-term time limit. It is far better to improve teachers than to seek measures to sack them.”

Chris Keates, general secretary of the NASUWT teaching union, said: “This is yet another depressingly predictable announcement from a government seemingly intent on destroying the teaching profession and state-education.

“The draconian measures announced today are totally unnecessary. There is no evidence which demonstrates that there are problems with the current system.”

Primary schools vs Gove: the battle over academies

Under the new arrangements, first announced last May, schools will be able to remove poor teachers from the classroom in about a term – a process that currently takes a year or longer.

The three-hour limit on observing teachers in the classroom will also be scrapped, to allow schools to decide on observation times.

The measures, to be introduced this September, cover maintained schools in England.

The Department for Education (DfE) said it is also consulting on new proposals covering teacher recruitment, which would see schools passing on information, if requested, to future employers, on whether a teacher is, or has been the subject of capability procedures.

The move would help to deal with the problem of poor teachers being “recycled” – moving from job to job, the DfE said.

Slim chance of hundreds of teachers losing their jobs

Hands up who wants to sack terrible teachers? It's a hard one to argue against, writes Channel 4 News Social Affairs Editor Jackie Long. No parent wants their child languishing in a classroom uninspired and learning nothing, and today the Education Secretary promised he'd bring this problem to an end.

First things first - how big a problem is it? Well, Michael Gove says it's hard to get an accurate sense of numbers but his department pointed us towards the last Ofsted annual report. It found teaching was inadequate in 3 per cent of the schools inspected.

According to other DfE figures only 17 teachers have been sacked for incompetence over the past decade, and Mr Gove's verdict is that that's not good enough.

So from September 2012 headteachers will have the powers to move quickly and decisively to get rid of teachers within a term.

He's won support from headteachers and there's little doubt among many parents that this will be a vote winner.

But will they be disappointed with how it pans out in reality? What are the chances of us seeing hundreds of teachers thrown out by the end of this autumn term?

They're slim. Legal experts I've spoken to today - even those in support of the changes - say a term is optimistic. And others told me the chances of cases ending up in a protracted tribunal process will increase - primarily because this is new territory and the shorter time frame may well see more teachers argue the dismissal is unfair.

Mr Gove himself has admitted that the numbers likely to end up being sacked is small. Perhaps a more pressing problem for the education secretary though is the response of the teaching unions.

One union leader said the changes are simply aimed at heads who fancy themselves as "contestants on The Apprentice and want to walk into a classroom and say You're Fired".

The biggest teaching union, the NASUWT, told us they're ready to fight it, if necessary going out on strike.

Yet again Mr Gove finds himself on a collision course with the unions.