Teachers at an all-girls school staged a strike on Tuesday after their demands for a pay increase were refused.

Sixteen teachers at Connaught School for Girls in Connaught Road, Leytonstone, hit the picket line in protest after talks with head teacher Sally Walker and the chair of governors fell through.

Teachers at the academy in Waltham Forest, an outer London borough, asked for an additional £1,000 on top of their existing salary for the next two years and to have their wages increased to meet the inner London pay rate by 2020.

Stephen White, division secretary of Waltham Forest National Education Union NUT section said: “We hope to hear from the management and the chair of governors to avoid any future action and we hope they will agree to our very modest demands.”

According to The Teachers’ Union, the salary of a qualified teacher in outer London from September 2017 to August 2018 ranges from £26,662 to £37,645 while in inner London it ranges from £28,668 to £39,006.

Ms Walker said it is with “deep regret” that only Year 11 pupils had class on Tuesday and said the school would “continue to seek constructive engagement with the NEU” to build on an existing offer of professional development opportunities for staff.

“The NEU has an industrial dispute with the school after submitting a claim for teachers to receive payment of the equivalent of inner London pay,” she said.

“The school trustees (governors) have determined that they are not in a position to meet this demand because, like all the secondary schools in Waltham Forest, the school is only funded to pay staff on outer London pay scales and paying inner London weighting would place the school in an impossible financial position.”

A further five days of strikes at the school which has more than 600 pupils are planned for March.