stelle Morris’s recent proposals for the future role of school support staff have led the press to speculate that they will trigger a good old-fashioned demarcation dispute between teacher and support-staff unions.

Evidence is beginning to emerge, however, of a much more complex picture of the work of schools. Assumptions about whether teaching assistants are the solution to teacher workload are being questioned, as, indeed, are the hopes of those who look forward to an inter-union battle.

Both the Office for Standards in Education and the Open University have recently published research highlighting the close working relationships between teachers and support staff.

Now, for the first time, the findings of a comprehensive survey of teachers’ views of support staff have been published by the NUT.

Despite the common belief that primary teachers receive teaching assistant support, just under 60 per cent don’t. In primary and secondary schools, support outside English, mathematics, special educational needs and English as an additional language remains a rarity.

Yet, teaching assistants are valued by teachers who are angered and embarrassed by their pay and conditions.

The survey confirms the conclusion by OFSTED that greater numbers of teaching assistants will not reduce teachers’ workloads. Their workload is changed, not reduced. More back-up in the classroom leads to increased management responsibilities. Delegation of tasks increases work planning.

There are mixed views about Estelle Morris’s proposals. Most teachers welcome the back-up given by teaching assistants for pupil behaviour and special needs. But an overwhelming majority say that assistants should not cover for teacher absence; only 3 per cent say they should.

The survey shows that the Government’s original commitment to strip away bureaucratic burdens has been reversed. Most teachers felt they needed about one to three hours a week more administrative assistance than they currently get.

A data-hungry education system is placing enormous burdens on teachers, including the inputting of pupil performance data and word-processing teaching materials. As a result, more than 95 per cent of teachers are dissatisfied with anything less than one hour per week administrative back-up.

This is the background against which the Government seeks to “remodel” the school workforce. The report paints a picture of both professionalism and frustration. There is deep suspicion that current government intentions are, as one teacher put it, about “beating QTS in one fell swoop and solving the teacher shortage!”

A number of agendas run within the current debate. Having understood each other’s top priorities, the TUC teacher and support-staff unions have pressed the Government for common solutions. The support-staff unions back teachers’ claims for contractual change to cut their workload. The teacher unions, in turn, back support staff in their campaign for better pay and conditions. All oppose the use of assistants as substitute teachers.

The Department for Education and Skills’ agenda is more murky. Its promotion of teacher assistants as “paraprofessionals” has raised suspicions that using them as substitute teachers is its intention.

Teachers have been required increasingly to carry out tasks outside their core duties. Properly paid and trained support staff should take on those duties.

The Government should stop resisting a cap on teacher workload and class contact time. And it should be made clear by the Government that teaching assistants are not substitute teachers. They should be valued for their complementary role. Otherwise, consensus will be a vain hope.

John Bangs is head of education at the National Union of Teachers