ELECTION 2010 ISSUE – What do you think? Leave comments below.
GRAHAM STUART, MP for Beverley and Holderness, says he is deeply 
concerned by official Government figures which reveal more than 1,000 pupils every school day are being suspended or expelled from schools for physical assaults, verbal abuse and threatening behaviour on both pupils and teachers.
A recent statement from the MP expresses concern that across the East Riding there were 10 expulsions for assaults and abuse and 560 suspensions in the last recorded year – equivalent to eight exclusions for each school day. Since 1997, Labour Government rules have deliberately made it more difficult for schools to expel pupils. This has undermined the authority of head teachers and means bullies and disruptive children end up back at the same school as their victims.
Labour Ministers have also hindered teachers on ‘human rights’ grounds from searching and confiscating items which might cause violence or disruption in schools. Now the Conservatives are pledging to give teachers new powers to tackle violence, to introduce home-school contracts to improve behaviour, and to reform the flawed exclusions process which undermines head teachers.
Graham Stuart states:
Despite the hard work of our teachers, it is clear we have a serious problem with discipline in our schools. Unless there is good discipline, pupils can’t learn and teachers can’t teach. The children who suffer most are the poorest and the country as a whole loses out when teachers’ authority is undermined. A Conservative Government will raise standards in schools, giving teachers across the East Riding the power to restore discipline. We need to encourage responsibility and back those who do the right thing.”