“Specialist schools have driven forward opportunity and excellence, not one at the expense of the other. Reform is not the enemy of social justice, but the route to it.”He argued that specialist schools had not “shut deprived children out of excellence but given them access to it”.The success of specialist schools showed any fears his reforms would create a two-tier system were “groundless”.David Miliband, minister for School Standards, told the conference that not all specialists schools were successful. The Government aims to have at least 2,000 specialist schools by 2006.Last year, Alastair Campbell, the Prime Minister’s official spokesman, angered headteachers by describing the Government’s reform of secondary schools as signalling the end of the “bog-standard” comprehensive.But yesterday Mr Blair told the Technology College Trusts’ annual conference in Birmingham that “enormous damage” had been done over the past 30 years by ideological arguments over the future of the comprehensive system.The debate was too often painted as being between “elitism versus equality”, he said. The Prime Minister launched a passionate defence of his education reforms yesterday – including the massive expansion of specialist schools – saying they were the route to, rather than the enemy of, social equality.
Tony Blair also announced that Charles Clarke, the Secretary of State for Education, would unveil further measures to increase the number of specialist schools later this week.Mr Clarke is expected to make specialist status easier for schools to achieve after complaints from headteachers who had struggled to raise the £50,000 in private sponsorship currently required There are 1,007 specialist schools, up from 262 in 1997. The teachers’ independent pay review body will rule on the claim in January The starting salary for a university lecturer is £19,575. There are three levels of London weighting: inner £2,353; outer £1,543; and fringe £602..

The teachers want £6,000 for inner London, parity with the Metropolitan police, £4,500 for outer and £2,500 for the Home Counties. London weighting also applies to members of the Surrey Ambulance Service.TEACHERS AND UNIVERSITY LECTURERSThe estimated 100,000 teachers in London and the Home Counties earn allowances of £3,105 if they live in inner London, £2,043 in outer London and £792 in the Home Counties. Officers in service before 1994 and who receive housing allowance of approximately £5,000 are paid a London allowance of £1,011.Police officers also have free travel to work by public transport from up to 70 miles away. That means a new London constable earns a £25,953 a year, including extra for working in the capital.NURSES AND AMBULANCE WORKERSA qualified G-grade nurse at the top of the range earns £30,405. That includes a total of £4,115 extra for working in London, a cost of living adjustment of £1,750 and an inner London Allowance of £2,365.

An ambulance worker in London can expect to earn £19,002 plus £2,135 in London weighting. Officers appointed after 1 September, 1994, and not in receipt of housing allowance are paid London allowance of £4,338. It does not help the argument in any way at all.”He added that those who started teaching in London in 1997 had already had a pay rise of 50 per cent, and that the profession’s independent pay review body was looking at further ways to recruit and retain teachers in the capital.Alex Kenny, a teacher from Tower Hamlets, east London, said: “Tomorrow we will all be back in school, but thousands of children going into school won’t know their supply teachers. It could be the fifth or sixth supply teacher they’ve had this year because of shortages.”As the protesters filed past posters of the beaming England wicket-keeper Alec Stewart proclaiming, “We’ll bring the Ashes back this winter”, you could be forgiven for thinking the teachers might put up a more determined show to get what they want.PAY AND ALLOWANCES WHO GETS WHATBy Sam PetersMETROPOLITAN POLICEPolice in London receive two extra pay elements, London weighting and London allowance Two years ago, the London Weighting figure rose to £1,713.