Graduates who take up teaching posts in subjects with staff shortages would have their student loans paid off, under new proposals announced by the government.

The "golden handcuffs" pay-off deal would see newly qualified teachers in maths, science, technology, languages and English saving about �10,000 over 10 years.

This is a substantial new incentive to graduates to come into and stay in teaching

David Blunkett

They would have 10% of their loan paid off by the government in each of the first 10 years of their careers, provided they stayed in the state education sector.

The move forms part of the government's new five-year strategy to drive up standards in secondary schools.

"This is a substantial new incentive to graduates to come into and stay in teaching," the Education Secretary, David Blunkett, told the House of Commons.

"To succeed in reforming standards in schools, we need to recruit and retain good teachers," Mr Blunkett said.

If they left the profession before then they would still have to pay the "residual amount" of their loans, the minister said.

Bureaucracy and workloads

There would also be new measures to improve training for teachers, cut down on bureaucracy and address workloads.

David Blunkett believes the loan pay-off scheme is a "substantial incentive"

Head teachers would also be given greater autonomy, Mr Blunkett told the House.

The government would be consulting with universities about developing teaching modules within a wide range of traditional academic undergraduate courses.

This would allow students to gain part of a teaching qualification while still and undergraduate, Mr Blunkett told MPs.

Teaching assistants

And there may also be a chance for undergraduates to take up paid work in teaching assistant posts, he added.

Such measures would allow "a vastly greater number" of students to see whether they liked teaching, Mr Blunkett said.

For those on existing undergraduate courses, the minister put forward three alternative proposals.

Firstly, students in their fourth year may not have to pay tuition fees and could receive a training bursary.

Or a salary might be paid in the fourth year of training, as is done on the graduate teacher programme.

Thirdly, exceptional fourth year students could be awarded qualified teacher status and be paid as a teacher before completion of their degree.

Loans 'in chaos'

The plan was welcomed by the National Association of Head Teachers, but the union wants to see the scheme offered to all newly-qualified teachers.

Nigel de Gruchy: "It smacks of panic"

Its general secretary, David Hart, said: "The government has now recognised what we have been saying for many weeks, namely that there is a crisis in terms of recruitment into the teaching profession."

The leader of the teachers' union NASUWT, Nigel de Gruchy, said: "It does smack of panic and it proves that NASUWT was right in describing the present situation over teacher recruitment as a crisis and not just a problem."

But he also thought it "threw into chaos" the whole principle of student loans.

"Teaching is a major recruiter of graduates and there are many other shortage subjects besides maths and science," he said.

"Students will be up in arms in protest if they are not one of the favoured group to have their fees waived.

'Stable door...'

"This is hardly joined-up government. On the one hand they charge students fees while with the other they hand them back."

The Liberal Democrat higher education spokesman, Evan Harris, said that trying to attract people into teaching by helping them cope with excessive debt was an admission of failure.

"This is the same government that increased the debt in the first place by introducing tuition fees and abolishing maintenance grants.

"It is like bolting the stable door after the horse has died," Dr Harris said.

The new incentive would be on top of the �4,000 "golden hellos" for which some entrants already qualify after their first year of teaching.

'Misses the point'

But the shadow education secretary, Theresa May, said a promise to fill the gaps sometime in the future did not address the problem.

Teachers were "leaving in droves", she told On the Record on BBC One.

Pay was not the overriding issue, they were weighed down by bureaucracy and a sense that they were not free to do their jobs.