Schools have been offered an extra £30,000 in funding to bring in LGBT educators, in order to ‘plug the diversity gap’.
In addition to this, the new teachers must be promoted within 12 months.
Although the move is great news for equal opportunities, some are concerned the extra funding may result in less-experienced teachers being placed.
The new £900,000 fund, which began accepting applications this year, has been slammed by David Green, of think-tank Civitas.
He told the Telegraph: "I think it’s profoundly misguided and the money could be better spent on providing more teachers for children from disadvantaged backgrounds.”
Mr Green also insisted the whole scheme should be ‘abolished’, and Conservative MP David Nuttall agreed – claiming it meant non-LGBT teachers are now being discriminated against.
He said: “Discrimination, positive or not, is still discrimination by its very nature. It means someone somewhere is being discriminated against.
“By definition it means that others who might be better qualified for promotion are discriminated against.”
The scheme also calls for ethnic minority groups to be targeted, and the Department for Education said it aims to support all ‘under-represented groups’.
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