By Sean Coughlan BBC News Online at the NUT conference in Harrogate

Teachers say pupils should be taught by qualified teachers

The National Union of Teachers, meeting in Harrogate for its annual conference, says that only qualified teachers should be in charge in the classroom.

The union has refused to sign up to a deal to cut teachers' workload, which would rely on a wider role for classroom assistants.

The conference will decide if there is to be a ballot for industrial action.

If teachers back calls for disruption, this could include a series of half-day strikes beginning in the next school year.

Opponents

The NUT is a longstanding opponent of the workload reduction agreement, which the government has signed with other teachers' unions.

The agreement, which is designed to lessen the burden on over-worked teachers, assumes that classroom assistants will take on more administrative tasks, and in certain circumstances will take classes without a teacher present.

But the NUT says that this threatens the principle of a professional, graduate teaching force, and that it raises the prospect of less-qualified and lower-paid assistants being used as substitutes for teachers.

The proposal for industrial action, which will be debated by the conference, is in opposition to "the employment of unqualified staff to teach whole classes".

There will also be calls for the union to build wider public support for a campaign against the use of classroom assistants as cover for teachers, including publicising the concerns to parents.