STUDENT teachers have been left distraught after learning they do not qualify for the Government's much trumpeted £6,000 training salary if they go to university in Scotland.

Many started courses this week unaware they would not receive the cash - which is designed to encourage more into the profession in a desperate bid to plug the teacher shortages crisis.

Their case has attracted the support of Lib Dem Education Spokesman and Harrogate MP Phil Willis.

He has called for the Government to address the funding criteria, which entitles Scottish students training at English or Welsh universities to the money.

Clare Hodgson, from Consett, County Durham, who is studying to be a drama teacher at Edinburgh University, only discovered she would not get the grant four days before she started the course.

Said Clare, 25: "There are quite a few of us up here who have only just found out.

"Some have been left in a lot of trouble financially and it's devastating for them. It's unfair - we're still English students, we just happen to be studying at a Scottish university."

Like many, Clare is likely to finish her course with more than £20,000 of debts. Her 22-year-old sister Anne, who is training to be a primary teacher at Sunderland University, is entitled to the cash.

The £6,000 training salaries have been available since September last year. Teachers receive a further £4,000 "golden hello" if they go on to teach a shortage subject such as maths or science.

Clare's dad, Durham County Councillor David Hodgson, has written an angry letter to Education Secretary Estelle Morris pointing out the "terrible discrimination."

But a spokeswoman for the Department for Education and Skills said the money was not available in Scotland because the country is run by a devolved parliament which does not have the grants.

She pointed out students do not pay tuition fees in Scotland. Lib Dem Education spokesman Phil Willis said it was something the Government "clearly had to address".

"It is an anomaly which is clearly a nonsense when you're trying to recruit and retain a UK teacher training force," he said.

"It makes it imperative that the Government does support the Scottish Executive in order to make the training salaries available north of the border."

A spokesman for Edinburgh University said: "We have been working on the expectation that people applying to Scottish universities would be aware that the English system of incentives does not apply north of the border. "We will certainly take this into account when it comes to preparing advice for applicants in the future."