The Labour party looking at setting up a state supply agency as part of plans to help save schools in the UK save £500 million a year from their supply teacher bill, reports TES News. Shadow education secretary Angela Rayner also outlined plans to set up a national substitute teacher register. During a Labour Party conference, Rayner stated "Led by our shadow schools minister Mike Kane, we’ll set out plans for a state-funded teacher supply service, fixing the failure of the free market, cutting out the waste and stopping the exploitation of agency workers." Labour added that it would examine the feasibility of setting up a state supply agency to compete within the market. Figures from the Department of Education show that schools in England spent £1.3 billion on supply teachers in 2015-16. Earlier this year, Secretary of State for Education Damian Hinds launched a clampdown on agencies charging schools “excessive” fees to recruit staff and advertise vacancies. Hinds also announced plans to reduce the cost of supply teachers by creating a list of supply agencies that do not charge fees when making supply staff permanent. The Director of Policy at the Recruitment and Employment Confederation Tom Hadley, commented, “Certainly costs must be controlled and a new framework contract has only just been launched with over a 100 agencies signed up. The idea that not using agencies at all would save significant amounts of money is misguided as there would be huge costs in establishing new structures and paying staff to try and replicate the expertise and 24/7 service that recruiters provide.”

Similar initiatives in the healthcare sector have had limited success with hospitals still having to rely on private staffing firms to source talent.