Private schools are facing a £100million "stealth raid" by the Government to fund teacher pensions in a move which could lead to significant rises in fees.

The Department for Education has revealed that from September employer's contribution for teachers' pensions will rise from 16.48 per cent of their salaries to 23.6 per cent.

The change, which comes into force in September, will cost private schools an extra £110million from 2019-20 and nearly £200million the following year.

Private schools are now faced with either pulling out of the teachers' pension scheme, making them less attractive to new teachers, or raising fees.

Steve Webb, Director of Policy at Royal London said:“It is hard to justify a stealth raid of £110m from independent schools simply because of an obscure change to the accounting rules around teachers’ pensions.

"Whilst this would be a nice windfall for the Treasury, this could lead to more schools pulling out of the Teachers’ Pension Scheme altogether which would be bad news for teachers. These are huge hikes in pension costs which schools cannot simply be expected to absorb”

‘These extra costs will either mean hikes in school fees for families, job cuts at schools or teachers being forced out of their current pension scheme. All of these could be avoided if the Treasury thought again."