The quality of a country's education system cannot exceed the quality of its teachers, MPs have been told.
Opening a Westminster Hall debate on teaching standards, Graham Stuart (Con, Beverley and Holderness) said that the quality of teachers should be the "prism" through which every decision on education is be made.
"Great teachers transform lives," he said.
Stuart argued that more needed to be done to attract the "best and brightest" to the profession.
The best graduates are often put off becoming teachers due to the low status of the job, he suggested.
Nick Gibb (Con, Bognor Regis and Littlehampton) cited a recent Policy Exchange report that showed undergraduates were put off teaching due to poor discipline in the classroom.
Almost a fifth of students polled by the think-tank named fears for their safety as the primary deterrent to teaching, ahead of concerns such as salary or status.
"Nearly two-thirds of teachers had considered leaving the profession because of aggressive pupils," Gibb added.
The Conservative shadow schools minister said a future Conservative government would abolish expulsion review panels which are able to overturn the exclusion of a pupil.
"The system completely undermines the headteacher's authority," he argued.
Gibb claimed that a fall in school standards was also deterring the best graduates from becoming teachers.
“We need to revive the academic value of the curriculum,” he said.
Stuart also called for schools to be given greater freedom on teacher recruitment.
The profession should not be a "closed shop" like accountancy and law, with more experienced professionals able to switch to teaching more easily later in life, he said.
This view was shared by Mark Field (Con, Cities of London and Westminster) who said the government needed to inspire people to go into teaching later in life amid concerns that the profession had become too much of an "organised, unionised workforce".
"We are moving to a tick box approach rather than a more open-minded approach," he said.
But schools minister Diana Johnson rejected claims that teachers were not held in high regard. She said there had been a "dramatic increase" in the professional status of teachers under Labour.
"Teachers are amongst the most valued professionals in society," she insisted.
Johnson said that classrooms were now "exciting" places that had been transformed over the last 12 years.
"As a result of investment Ofsted has rated the current generation of teachers as the best we’ve ever had," she said.
