New teacher recruitment advert is ‘misleading’, says NUT

ASA has confirmed it has received a complaint about the Department for Education’s (DfE) advert which was intended to encourage more students to take up teaching. The complaint was lodged by the NUT executive member Martin Powell-Davies.

Although official figures displayed on the government teacher payscale confirms the possibility to earn up to £65,978 in inner London, Mr Powell-Davies claimed the advert was ‘deliberately misleading’ because the number of teachers actually earning this rate was a considerably small proportion.

He said: "The DfE is clearly deliberately ignoring the real issue, that we are facing a growing crisis of teacher recruitment and morale.

“Instead they have spent millions of pounds on an advert which is clearly deliberately misleading, because the proportion of teachers who actually earn £65,000 a year is absolutely miniscule.”

Before any action is taken, the ASA must first asses the complaint to 'carefully to establish whether there are grounds for further action'. The watchdog has said that many cases where complaints are submitted are closed after further assessment showed no grounds for investigation.

A spokesperson for the ASA said: “If we consider that the complainant has raised a valid point and that the ad could potentially break the rules, we will contact the advertiser and ask for their comments. An advertiser may, at that stage, be able to provide evidence to immediately back up its claim and satisfy us that the rules haven’t been broken.

“In other instances, the advertiser may agree to amend or withdraw its ad without the need for a formal investigation. In those instances we consider the matter ‘informally resolved’ and close the case.”

If the advertiser disagreed with the complaint lodged and wanted to defend itself, a formal investigation would be launched, initiating a ‘reverse burden of proof’ principle where by the advertiser is responsible from disproving the claims.

A DfE spokesperson said: “Teachers have the potential to earn up to £65k and hundreds do – that excludes those in leadership roles who can earn more.

“Teachers play a vital role in raising standards and ensuring all pupils can reach their full potential. That is why we have given all heads much greater flexibility to set staff pay and reward their best teachers with a pay rise.”

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