Cuts in the bursaries given to trainee primary school teachers in England could put the number of young teachers coming into the profession at risk, experts have warned. 

From next year, the amount of funding given to people training to work in primary schools will be slashed, and Prof John Howson, an expert in the teaching workforce and honorary research fellow at Oxford University, said that this will be a risk. 

The Times Education Supplement said that some of the bursaries available next year will be two-thirds lower in value than they have been this year. And it said that more than half of all new trainees could be affected by the changes. 

The government said that the reasoning behind the cut in bursaries was that it needs to make sure it is focusing such funding in the right areas. However, Prof Howson said this is a tactic that could damage the intake of new trainee teachers.

He said that although the government met its targets for primary teacher recruitment this year, it did miss the target a year before, meaning it cannot afford to rest on its laurels when it comes to attracting newcomers to the industry. 

The expert said that removing funding like this could create "a yo-yo effect" when it comes to recruitment of new trainees and risked "creating a crisis in primary where there isn't one".

Lizana Oberholzer of the National Association of School Based Teacher Trainers, said that there was a worry people would move towards training in areas where they do not need to incur debts rather than moving into teaching. 

"The reduction of bursaries could mean it is not attractive for people to train to teach,""The reduction of bursaries could mean it is not attractive for people to train to teach," she said. 

"We are worried we won't be able to recruit high quality teacher trainees without the incentive of high value bursaries in future."