End to teacher blacklists ordered

LOCAL AUTHORITIES were ordered to close unofficial teacher blacklists yesterday after a survey found 39 councils held registers of staff banned from working in schools.

Estelle Morris, the schools minister, said she would be writing to councils instructing them to turn over their lists.

A survey by the BBC2 programme Just One Chance, broadcast last night, found that the names of 1,000 teachers suspected of child abuse were held on unofficial blacklists, but did not appear on the national register of banned teaching staff, known as "List 99".

Education officers fear suspected abusers may slip through the net because informal blacklists are not shared between employers.

Matt Dunkley, assistant director of education in East Sussex, told the programme: "We may have somebody who has been found by us to have been guilty of, for example, a sexual assault on a child, but if that has not resulted in a criminal prosecution for whatever reason, the Department for Education is unlikely to put them on List 99 ... although we may be completely convinced of their guilt.

"Some teachers that I personally and my colleagues who work in this field are convinced are guilty of abusive acts toward children are still teaching, are still being allowed to teach, and there's nothing I can do about it."

But the minister said: "I am concerned that local authorities are apparently holding secret lists. I would say to local authorities: don't keep secret lists. Let me have the names of those people you think should not be working with children and we will look at them and take action.

"If you have a secret list, that's not on. We all have an obligation as adults to protect children from bad behaviour and we need a central list, not local secret ones. It's not good enough," said Ms Morris.

"If there is any question that people should not be working with children, they are put on List 99 and banned."

Teachers' leaders back the official List 99, but attacked the practice of holding unofficial registers, saying it could lead to innocent staff being victimised. Careers could be ruined if teachers were wrongly accused of abuse.

Olwyn Gunn of the National Association of Schoolmasters Union of Women Teachers, said: "This is almost a vigilante approach. Unofficial lists fly in the face of natural justice."

Peter Smith, general secretary of the Association of Teachers and Lecturers, said his union would back any member who suspected that they were secretly blacklisted. "This can prevent people from getting employment without the person who is looking for a job ever knowing there is a list, whether they are on it, or who is saying what to whom.

"Whether it's local government or national government, there is no scope for half-open government. If somebody is on a list they should have a way of knowing they are on it."

But Graham Lane, education chairman of the Local Government Association, insisted that blacklists were not widespread. "There might be some information which is not destroyed, but it would be held under lock and key," he said. "I don't think there's anything for the unions to be concerned about."