As teachers take industrial action to bring the government to the negotiating table and hopefully address the issues the industry is taking, it is a good time to reflect on the issues of performance-related pay.

Since September 1st, schools in England have been able to link teachers' pay to performance, something which the government believes will enable them to reward teachers who nurture high-performing students more.

It was an idea first proposed by the Independent School Teachers' Review Body and now every school is beginning the process of revising their pay and appraisal policies to show how they will incorporate performance-related pay in time for the first proposed salary increases this time next year. 

Despite people in teaching jobs in London and other areas which are set to see strikes not taking kindly to the idea of performance-related pay, recent think tank findings suggested in time, they may change their minds - especially if it means less paperwork.

Commenting on the poll on performance-related pay by Policy Exchange, Christine Blower, general secretary of the National Union of Teachers, the largest teachers union, said: "A clear majority of teachers are far more concerned about workload than any apparent benefits of performance-related pay. According to this survey, only two per cent said that it would make them significantly more likely to want to work in a school where pay was more explicitly linked to overall performance.  Far more said it would make them less likely. 

"Even under the proposal of performance-related pay being offered in return for an imagined reduction in bureaucratic workload, only 13 per cent said that it would make them significantly more interested in working in a school with performance-related pay. Yet in many schools the introduction of performance-related pay will lead to a much greater bureaucratic workload as head teachers introduce new forms and evidence gathering."

Yet there is another issue that is equally problematic for the government's performance related-pay plans. It seems as if the extra money required to reward the high-performing teachers will be taken from stalling the incremental salary increases of the teachers who are not hitting their targets.