Teachers are to get a personal assistant in each class, under plans due to be announced by the government next week.

The assistants, who are being introduced in a bid to ease teachers' workload, will also be able to teach drama, music, sport and foreign languages.

Their participation will free up half a day a week for teachers to concentrate on marking and preparations.

Forum Response: Professional Association of Teachers

Jean Gemmell, general secretary for PAT, told ePolitix.com: "We welcome reports that limits are to be placed on teachers' working hours.

"At the moment, teachers are working excessively long hours and have to do much of their non-teaching work in their own time. Being a teacher involves more than teaching. However, we must wait and see the detail of how this will work in practice.

"Our proposal has been for guaranteed preparation and marking time in a proportion of 1:2 hours taught, with half of this to be within the school day.

"We still wish to see a limit in the number of hours in which teachers can be expected to carry out other duties, and limits to the duties expected of teachers.

"We would also welcome the proposed increase in the number of support staff. We are pleased that reports suggest that some of the tasks, such as photocopying and filing, that have traditionally been carried out by teachers, but are a poor use of their time, can be undertaken more appropriately by support staff.

"We are particularly pleased to see that there should be greater acknowledgement and involvement of teaching assistants. Many of those already in post are highly skilled and completing their tasks effectively.

"However, it is vital that assistants receive appropriate training. Reports suggest a new grade of advanced teaching assistants. We hope that this will be based on our own model of Chartered Teaching Assistants which would give teaching assistants proper recognition for their key role in education, using a three-stage career and salary structure based on qualifications, experience and ongoing professional training.

"We are disappointed that the Government's findings have been leaked tothe media before the official launch on Tuesday and await the full details with interest. We recognise that some of these changes will not happen overnight and will need a matching commitment on funding. However, there seem to be real opportunities here for reform of the teachers' contract to tackle the workload issue."

Forum Response: National Union of Teachers

Doug McAvoy, general secretary of the National Union of Teachers, said the proposals "would be a reversal of what we've campaigned for and had in place for the best part of 30 years".

"They wouldn't be a mile away from the mum's army" scheme put forward under John Major's government a decade ago, which sought to put more unqualified helpers in the classroom. That was opposed by teachers' leaders as a "dumbing down" of the profession.

"How can parents be persuaded that the government is raising standards if it plans to use unqualified people as teachers?"