Recently, teaching authorities have been preoccupied with ensuring respect is instilled in the classroom. 

Ofsted has named and shamed the first teachers it found to dress in a scruffy manner during its inspections. The watchdog said the way London teachers at Acland Burghley secondary school in Camden dressed was spreading a lack of pride throughout the school. 

Meanwhile, education secretary Michael Gove has deemed the reason many pupils display signs of unruly behaviour is that teachers are simply forgetting to punish them. He sent around a list of approved disciplinary actions to schools to remind teachers of their options, showing a stunning lack of insight into the issue of respect in classrooms.  

This lack of insight appears to be contagious in the cabinet as business secretary Vince Cable has now said people in teaching jobs know "absolutely nothing" about the world of work.

The Lib Dem minister was speaking to a room of manufacturing industry executives and insinuated teachers' insular attitudes are causing them to give students the wrong career advice.

Dr Cable defended the current government's policies, saying there was now a spate of appropriate options for school leavers, and instead placed the blame at the door of the nation's teachers and the "underlying problem" of their lack of knowledge about the workplace.

He said: "There has been an argument in government about how to get the right careers advice in schools and successive governments have frankly messed this up.

"But the underlying problem is, of course, that most teachers, particularly in the secondary sector, are graduates.

"They know how universities work, they know what you have to do to get an A-level, they know about Ucas forms - but they know absolutely nothing about the world of work."

The Department for Education moved quickly to distance itself from the comments, with a source telling the Guardian the nation's teachers will find these words "deeply offensive" and the business secretary "clearly has no idea" how hard people work in secondary schools. 

Christine Blower, general secretary of the National Union of Teachers, said the views were "insulting". She explained teachers are workers in their own right and as a body are representative of society with many coming from diverse backgrounds with different life experiences. 

Following the backlash, sources close to Dr Cable backtracked, saying the minister was "very pro-teachers". However, what sort of example does this set and where does it leave the fight to instill respect back into the classroom?

The Department for Education source who spoke to the Guardian said the Liberal Democrats should be supporting teachers rather than attacking them and that is exactly what is needed to change attitudes in the classroom.

How can pupils respect their teachers when a secretary of state is telling youngsters their educators 'know nothing about the world of work'? The Pisa tests the government is giving so much significance to show a direct correlation between the social standing of teachers and pupil performance. How can the coalition expect to improve the UK's education system if it is attacking teachers at every turn?

If the government truly wants a world-class education system, surely it should empower teachers rather than undermine them. If ministers do what they can to position teachers as people who warrant respect, then pupils' attitudes may begin to change and teachers will not need to be reminded of the disciplinary actions at their disposal in order to elicit good behaviour from their students.