teachers, Opposition education critic Miss Jennifer Smith charged yesterday.

Government spent $262,785 to bring in 32 overseas teachers during the last three years -- a cost of more than $8,000 per person, she said.

But Education Minister the Hon. Gerald Simons yesterday defended the spending.

"It's not uncommon for a business to spend $10,000 to recruit a professional -- and this is what we are talking about here,'' he said.

He said teacher recruitment was "one of the most critical functions this department performs'' and he described overseas recruitment as "inherently expensive.'' Recruitment costs approaching $100,000 are not excessive when one considers that the Department spends about $25 million a year on salaries, he added.

Miss Smith said she found the recruitment spending especially troubling in light of the fact that a programme to train new Bermuda teachers had been delayed for lack of money.

About 30 Bermudians had expressed interest in the programme, which would take people who already have degrees and re-train them as teachers. The programme had called for them to spend three weeks this summer studying at Queen's University in Ontario, and then to work as trainee teachers in Bermuda for the 1992-1993 school year.

They would complete their teacher training at the Bermuda College next summer.

The Queen's programme "could have vastly helped with the Bermudianisation of the service,'' Miss Smith said. The costs would have been minimal, she said: Three weeks at Queen's this summer, and teaching salaries that would have to be paid to somebody anyway.

Mr. Simons said the programme "wouldn't overnight turn the situation around.

The overwhelming majority of Bermudians who currently wish to be teachers have gone into the profession already.'' In answer to questions from Miss Smith in the House of Assembly on Friday, Mr.

Simons said 12 non-Bermudian teachers were recruited in the 1989-90 school year, 13 in 1990-1991, and seven in 1991-1992.

A recruitment trip to the United Kingdom in May this year cost $13,516 -- which included $7,554 for accommodation at the Park Lane Hotel in London, $3,762 in airfares and about $2,200 in food and miscellaneous expenses. It is expected that eight teachers will be recruited, he said.

The cost of relocating teachers from the UK to Bermuda varies with their individual circumstances. The cost for an unmarried teacher works out to $2,084, made up of $1,254 in airfare and a maximum baggage allowance of $830.

Miss Smith said the department could save money by putting overseas teachers on three-year work permits, as it did until recently, instead of one-year permits. And she suggested it use professional recruitment firms rather than send two or three Department officers on recruiting trips to Britain.

But Mr. Simons said recruitment agencies were no bargain. He knew from personal business experience that they could charge 10 to 20 percent of the job's annual salary.

The Education Department has used agencies in the past, he said, "but we were not satisfied with the selections made.''