News

In a week during which many issues – from Nick Griffin’s appearance on Question Time to the continuing violence in Afghanistan and Iraq – grabbed the headlines, I was particularly struck by the case of Mark Ellwood.

Mr Ellwood was a teaching assistant who was cleared of assaulting a schoolboy after a nine month investigation. The boy had sat in the classroom playing with his mobile phone and wearing his outdoor jacket. When Mr Ellwood noticed this, he asked the boy to remove the jacket and put away the phone. The boy said, “I will have you killed,” and threatened to stab him.

Mr Ellwood took the boy out of the classroom, through the corridor and into the school car park. As he did so, the boy tried to kick him in the shins, and Mr Ellwood responded by sweeping the boy’s legs from under him.

The boy claimed that Mr Ellwood violently threw him onto the classroom floor but evidence from a teacher in the same classroom showed that wasn’t true. The investigation took eight months during which the social services department of the council concerned demanded that Mr Ellwood move out of his home.

The fact that Mr Ellwood was ultimately cleared does not of course begin to compensate for what he suffered during that time.

This was not an isolated case. Teachers feel that the power to discipline children has been taken away from them. In fact the teachers are allowed, in law, physically to restrain pupils but many are unaware of this. I have great sympathy with the call of the National Union of Teachers for more training to ensure that the legal position is properly understood.

I believe that this is an issue of fundamental importance. If we cannot have a general acceptance of discipline in our schools, we are storing up a great deal of trouble for the future. I think it is, in general, true that we have become a less disciplined society. That trend begins in our schools. If it is not remedied in our schools it is a trend that will gather force.

So I believe that teachers deserve our support. Their ability to impose discipline should be more widely understood and accepted. Otherwise we shall be sowing the seeds of a crop we would greatly prefer not to have to harvest.