§ 3.17 p.m.
§ Lord GridleyMy Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
§ The Qusetion was as follows:
§ To ask Her Majesty's Government what action is being taken to prevent assaults by pupils on their teachers in state schools.
215§ The Minister of State, Department of Education and Science (Baroness Young)My Lords, responsibility for action lies with local education authorities and schools.
§ Lord GridleyMy Lords, I thank the Minister for her Answer. Will she confirm that it has now been found necessary to place a price on the life of a teacher, who, on death from assault in any of our schools, is to receive a minimum payment of compensation of £23,000; for loss of hearing £9,400; and for the loss of the lower jaw £7,400, et cetera? Will my noble friend not agree that the necessity for these provisions, which I do not challenge, causes widespread anxiety? Can they really be left in the hands of the local authority and unions, and should not some attempt be made to resolve them by the Department of Education and Science?
§ Baroness YoungMy Lords, the agreement to which my noble friend refers, and which was part of an article in The Times Educational Supplement, is in fact the revision of an existing agreement between the associations of local authorities and the teachers, and the Government are not a party to such agreements. We find assaults on teachers deplorable, but I do not think we ought to exaggerate the position. The Inspectorate carried out a survey of secondary schools, and of the whole sample of schools, 384 schools, only seven schools reported hostility to teachers to be considerable and not one school said that its situation was serious.
§ Baroness GaitskellMy Lords, while agreeing with the Minister that this is a deplorable state of affairs, is it not due to the low morale about education in general, the shortage of books, the quality of the teachers, and the general atmosphere, as I say, of low morale in education due to all the cuts that have been made against education?
§ Baroness YoungNo, my Lords, it is not that. That is not the reason. Unfortunately this problem has been with us for a number of years. We have no evidence that it is actually getting worse at the present time. I think it has a lot of deep-seated causes which it would require much longer than Question Time to go into.
§ Lord Davies of LeekMy Lords, is the noble Baroness aware that some of us who have spent our lives in various branches either of teaching or of lecturing want to draw attention to the fact that teaching is more of a calling than it is anything else and that it is too simple to say that the onus should be upon the local education authorities? The destiny of this country is imperilled if our children are not brought up in an environment which encourages a discipline. The whole of society seems askew—
§ Lord Davies of LeekAnd the eccentric activity of children and violence of five to eight year-olds is bewildering the educational world, and I think imperilling the future and destiny of this country.
§ Lord Davies of LeekEvery sentence had a question at the beginning.
§ Baroness YoungMy Lords, I think we would all agree that the responsibility for this action does not exclusively rest with schools, it rests very largely with parents as well. It is important that society should recognise that the upbringing of children and the responsibility for them is first a matter for parents and that the schools and the parents need to support one another.
§ Lord Vaux of HarrowdenMy Lords, is my noble friend the Minister satisfied that there is a positive and constructive relationship at local level between the social services, the educational authority, and the Health Service?
§ Baroness YoungMy Lords, this of course would vary with different local authorities, but it is I think essential that there should be co-operation between the education and the social services departments, particularly with children who clearly have behavioural problems.