By Steve Bargeton and Steven Bell

SHOCK FIGURES published by the Scottish Executive yesterday show that the number of tearaways kicked out of school has fallen for the third year in a row—while the number of attacks on teachers has rocketed.

During 2002-03 there were 36,496 exclusions from local authority primary, secondary and special schools in Scotland, a decrease of 3% from 2001-02.

Last month Education Minister Peter Peacock ordered a review of school data after reported attacks on staff jumped from 5412 to 6899—an average of one every 12 minutes.

In November Mr Peacock also scrapped the formal targets for schools exclusions.

Yesterday’s figures show that Dundee topped the league table for school exclusions recording 91 per thousand pupils against a Scottish average of 50. The city also had the highest rate of exclusions from primary schools at 19 per thousand.

In Fife total exclusions per thousand pupils was 62, in Angus 45, in Perth and Kinross 35 and in Stirling 18.

More than 99% of all exclusions from Scottish schools were temporary. In 292 cases, pupils were removed from the register of the school, a decrease of 12% from the 2001-02 figure.

General or persistent disobedience accounted for almost a quarter of all removals from class, followed by verbal abuse of staff (18%) and physical abuse of fellow pupils (13%).

A Dundee City Council spokesman said the authority “continues to take discipline in its schools very seriously and exclusion is used, where necessary, as part of a wide range of strategies to help improve pupils’ behaviour.

“These latest figures show that the number of exclusions in Dundee City Council schools has dropped by 6% over the last year, compared to a national fall of 2%.”

According to the statistics, 207 children were excluded from Dundee primary schools last year. At secondary schools there were 1596 exclusions while just two pupils were excluded from special schools. The total figure of 1805 temporary removals from class involved 917 different pupils. No children were removed from the register.

The spokesman continued, “It is essential that parents are involved in the process of improving pupils’ behaviour in school. Procedures are in place to ensure that they fully discuss the situation with the school as soon as possible before the pupil returns from exclusion.

The Education Minister said he wanted the numbers of pupils removed from school to decrease further.

“Pupils and teachers have the right to work undisrupted,” said Mr Peacock.

“I have recently announced a range of measures to improve discipline and exclusions are an important part of the solution, albeit as a last resort measure.

“I have seen at first hand the excellent work being done to reduce exclusions and to stop minor incidents escalating into serious problems.

“I want today’s downward trend to continue but as a result of best practice being shared among schools, not national targets. We will not second guess the decisions that need to be taken daily by head teachers to protect staff and the majority of hard-working pupils.

“The review of how we collect evidence on school discipline, announced last month, will also help us better understand the reasons behind exclusions and ensure we make further progress to address more serious types of behaviour.”

But the Scottish Tories said it is no coincidence that the incidence of violence against teachers has simultaneously rocketed.

The party’s education spokesman Lord James Douglas-Hamilton said, “School staff are clearly not being protected from violent pupils. This is unacceptable, and staff should be more strongly supported. Teachers should have the right to refuse to teach any pupil who has a proven record of violence in school.”

SNP education spokesman Fiona Hyslop said, “The Executive have tried ignore this problem and offer excuses, but these figures make a total mockery of Peter Peacock’s recent claims that problems with the data made it impossible to get a true picture of violence in Scottish schools.

“The worry is that since 1999, the number of pupils who have been excluded after verbally or physically attacking teachers has gone up by over 1000.”