18/05/2017 Scottish First Minister's Questions

Thank you, what engagement has she planned for the rest of the day?

Engagement city for the government didn't programme for Scotland. I

will take part in the ITV leaders debate which Theresa May is ducking.

We don't have enough teachers in Scotland and given the fact that all

sides accept this, does the First Minister agree that when young

people here do choose teaching as a career, we should do everything we

can that they stay? As we've discussed before, Scotland in common

with many other countries faces a challenge in teacher recruitment. We

are increasing the intake. We're looking at different routes into

teaching. Ruth Davidson is going to ask about teach first I have said

before I am open-minded to looking at

ideas as to how we get young people into teaching but we have to make

sure that these ideas work for Scottish education so we will

continue to make sure we address the challenges we face. Let's have a

little look at teach first. We land in the last five years that nearly

four they were attracted by the teach first programme. That's 400

enthusiastic young teachers who could be in the schools were down

but can't because Nicola Sturgeon says so. We have heard in recent

days about the huge quality issues surrounding teacher training here.

Given that, can the First Minister give me a single good reason why she

is stopping new schemes.