The councils responding said almost £14.5m was paid out in salaries for those suspended during the same period of time. But the total cost to taxpayers will be higher when other local authorities are taken into consideration.
The most common reason for suspending a teacher was because of child protection issues, which includes allegations of verbal abuse, unreasonable force against a pupil, indecent assault, downloading child pornography. Other reasons were misuse of drugs or alcohol, and gross misconduct. The length of suspensions ranged from about a week to, in one case, more than four years.
Teaching unions have been expressing concern for some time about growing numbers of false allegations made against teachers by pupils or their parents.
Some allegations have been coupled with compensation claims made against local authorities. "There's a worrying trend of parents not going to the head teacher, but instead heading straight to the police," says Sharon Liburd, a solicitor for the Association of Teachers and Lecturers.
