SCHOOLS should close for half a day instead of being forced to comply with new government legislation to free up teachers' time, a Bolton union chief has said.

Barry Conway, secretary of the National Union of Teachers in Bolton, says giving teachers half a day off each week on a rota basis would be too costly.

Instead, he believes headteachers should cancel all lessons on one afternoon and allow teachers to mark work and plan lessons during that time.

New education reforms, to be introduced in September, aim to free up 10 per cent of teachers' time for tasks like marking and planning.

Mr Conway agrees in principle with the workforce reform agreement introduced by Education Secretary and Bolton West MP Ruth Kelly, which sets time aside for planning, preparation and assessment (PPA).

But he believes implementing the legislation would put financial pressure on schools, and he is calling on the government to pay for support staff to be brought in or give schools half a day off.

Mr Conway, who is the NUT representative for Bolton, said: "We're not going to be blackmailed by the government. We cannot afford this legislation. At the end of the day it will be staff at schools who are going to suffer.

"Schools should take half a day off per week as part of the PPA, which means that we don't lose anything financially. The PPA is something we want, but we are not going to pay for it."

The nation's biggest head teacher's union, the National Association of Head Teachers, last week decided to pull out of the workforce reform agreement because they believed they did not have enough money to make the legislation work.

But Ms Kelly told the Association of Teachers and Lecturers' annual conference in Torquay on Wednesday that the legislation would be introduced in September, and warned that teachers who did not get extra time for planning could take legal action.

She said: "This will be law from September and they have to implement it. We won't tolerate any excuses.

"They can't use funding as a smokescreen for not implementing the agreement. They should be doing it now. They shouldn't be waiting until September."

Under the arrangements, classes may be led by support staff, although they should be planned and supervised by teachers.

One way in which schools are freeing up time is by introducing the idea of "golden time", in which children do activities not tied to the curriculum. One school has arranged for qualified sports coaches to run lessons with support staff.